Okawau face-lift

[RNG_god]

Let's face it - Okawaru is plagued by a simple idea that works well but can turn very bland, very quickly. This notion is obviously not something new with those of us that have been playing for years - but I figured, after brainstorming about this one night, I might as well make an account and share my idea.

Here are the issues (as far as I can tell)

Heroism - great ability early on, once most of your skills are 27 however it quickly loses it's charm and usability... this is, if I recall correctly, one of the few god abilities that sort of just fall off and become useless (correct me if I'm wrong).

Finesse - again awesome ability, but once an Oka worshiper finds a book with haste in it is there really a point to finesse? Granted not every oka worshiper would be able to learn haste, but honestly, it's not that difficult to make it even as a melee character.

Oka Gifts - slightly worse than acquirement - still obviously has it's uses, until it just becomes floor clutter and more annoying than useful.

So in summary we have a bizarre work around his old Might ability, a bootleg Haste, and sometimes useful equipment. Am I the only one seeing an issue? I hope not.

My idea is pretty simple and I already know there will be backlash but I need to get it off my chest.

At maximum piety the player can summon a Champion of Okawaru to fight along side them. Only one can be summoned at a time, and they'd be durably summoned, similar to the Mercenary Card.

Reasoning - the reasoning behind this is very simple, Oka has always been pigeon-holed into being the god that doesn't like summons or doesn't work well with summoners due to his depreciation of letting allies die, but that's because most people use summons as expendable meat shields. In war there are allies... TRUE allies, not summons that puff away or that you have no emotional attachment to. This would create that sense of companionship as the ally would grow with you and reap the benefits of Oka's equipment gifts.

Flavorwise, If we were to give the player the option to durably summon one warrior under Oka, it would add a nice bit of tension to try to not anger Oka and keep the summon alive and would force the player to walk that thin line between winning a fight and angering the God which I would find a bit fun and definitely more interesting. It would sort of flesh out WHY Oka doesn't like allies dying.

The Champion could be chosen at random from a predetermined list of species and could be balanced, or perhaps just using the same exact mechanic as the Mercenary Card would be easier.

The reason I want to make it a durable equipable summon is as follows:

*to set it apart from other god summoning abilities

*not have it be an instant meat shield - this is a companion that Oka has given you, a friend, not a meat shield

*to add a bit more meaning and perhaps even build an attachment to said summon

*and to finally put to use all of the Oka gift clutter

In the end the player, if they've kept this one time summon alive, should have a melee fighter that's almost on par with themselves and can (probably) help out until Zot.

Thoughts?

[Bim]

I've never thought permanent allies were a bad idea, but I know many people do and consider them against the heart and soul of crawl, nay, the very foundation of crawl (which changes bi-monthly and every third Wednesday).

Anyway, I like the idea, however,I feel that it'd be hellishly difficult to balance. If it was powerful enough to survive the late game it'd be way to powerful (think about all the AoE spells an the like) and if it wasn't useful enough to help out at that point, it'd just be a waste of piety.
The tension/keeping it alive could get annoying as well (one of the main reasons perma summons are disliked) even if it was well balanced - without any micro-controls over it's behaviour it'd probably just keep rushing into groups of dracs. and getting itself whacked pretty quickly.

[nicolae]

I've never thought permanent allies were a bad idea, but I know many people do and consider them against the heart and soul of crawl, nay, the very foundation of crawl (which changes bi-monthly and every third Wednesday).

Even if permanent allies weren't a contentious feature of Crawl, there's already two gods that give you perma-allies, and it's not likely the devs are looking for a third.

[rebthor]

Finesse is better at attacking than haste as haste exists today. Additionally, why would you train to 27 when you can train to 22?

So yeah, when you've all but one the game with 15 runes and 3 cleared zigs, Okawaru loses some of his lustre. Is that really a problem?

[RNG_god]

But why would I train to 22 when I can train to 27 and stop relying on Heroism? Stopping at 22 is good for hybrids I suppose, but still...

I think a onetime warrior is a bit different than a cloud of orcs or a cloud of various undead.Those are expendable, this is sometime quite different considering Oka's ally conduct.

EDIT: furthermore, its not an oka gift... it's an oka ability. With enough piety cost to automatically bump you down a star at max piety.... seems fair I think.

[Sandman25]

But why would I train to 22 when I can train to 27 and stop relying on Heroism? Stopping at 22 is good for hybrids I suppose, but still...

I think a onetime warrior is a bit different than a cloud of orcs or a cloud of various undead.Those are expendable, this is sometime quite different considering Oka's ally conduct.

It takes much time to train Weapon/Armour/Dodging/Fighting from 22 to 27.
I believe Okawaru worshipers usually learn some spells so they enjoy having extra EXP to spend on magic.

[Baldu]

I feel like i have to challenge your initial comments on oka: heroism means i can stop training my main skills well before 27 and instead train up secondary skills (adding cblink/tornado/shatter to a strong melee dude is a significant increase in power!), finesse doesn't give glow so it is still very useful, and while gifts are mostly junk, there are still more than enough that are great.

I still kinda like your idea though, but i think it would be nice if the dude would share life and buffs with the main hero, that would make it pretty unique. Also, if it ever happens, i hope something can be worked out to make it scale without relying on it equipping floor items since i loathe equipping allies.

[Davion Fuxa]

Thoughts?

Discussion: Improving Okawaru

Originally I had a similar concept. You can see some of the reasoning here why people didn't like the idea.

[Wahaha]

Not seeing any issue. Oka is really strong, so no need for a buff. His abilities are used regularly, and heroism is an interesting and fun ability. His piety gain mechanic is the most enjoyable out of every god. Why people think he's boring is a mystery to me.

[RNG_god]

Hm, at any rate I do still believe Oka deserves some sort of reworking.

The argument that we already have gods that gift perma allies is not a reasonable one considering Oka's unique ally mechanic/conduct (which as of right now barely serves any purpose outside of excluding summoners and doesn't do anything flavor wise and is totally unexplained and unwarranted considering there's a very limited way to receive allies outside of summoning) and the fact that it's one Merc instead of a cloud of meat shields that end up dying anyway.

As far as his other abilities go - they're not really that great... They're practical to a point.

Heroism - ok, I can stop training at 22 and use exp on magic and other such things - but there's a god better suited to that sort of exp minigame, Ash. And even then, at some point Heroism does lose it's usability. If I'm worshiping something and what is being offered becomes obsolete something's wrong.

Finesse - a no glow, but still bootlegged haste. Which in the long run, a character planning to survive would do better learning Haste and dealing with glow than using Finesse.

That's all that's being offered while worshiping Oka. Does that not seem underwhelming and unflavored to anyone?

Perhaps we need to rethink what makes a god of war exactly that and put it into the context of Crawl.


EDIT: All I gathered from that previous topic is the rebuttal being based on not wanting another ally-support god. But the way this would be handled is completely different, mechanic wise and flavor wise, that I'm under the impression there just seems to be a bad case of contrarian attitude floatin around Crawl nowadays.

If what a god offers has to be backed/augmented up by non-god given spells to be a feasible choice, then it's time to worship a new god, so to speak (or redesign it)

[crate]

One of the good things about okawaru's design is that he is straightforward and uncomplicated. If you want a god who is more complex, I would suggest you go look at the other gods Crawl offers; there are plenty of them.

[cerebovssquire]

Have you considered using Haste and Finesse at the same time? Are you not aware that Finesse is better than Haste when it comes to melee damage (2x speed)?

Your argument against training skills to 22 (or lower levels, since you really don't need 27 skill) is "ash is better at gaming xp" (what does that imply about oka? does ash double your combat speed, and does every god need to be as crazily overpowered as ash?) and "it isn't good in lategame", maybe you should explain that a little bit. How it it not good in the late game, and why do you just dismiss the opportunity to train magic and other skills, your wording is really just saying "this is bad" and expecting us to be convinced. Do you have a lot of experience with Okawaru on low-aptitude races, because obviously Heroism is even better there, and only playing Minotaurs or something might affect your impression.

Finally, what is wrong with gods not being consistently powerful? Many other gods have different power levels at different points in the game. You would need to fundamentally change the way crawl approaches balance and the difficulty game before "oka gets weaker late, this is bad" becomes a good argument.

[RNG_god]

Have you considered using Haste and Finesse at the same time? Are you not aware that Finesse is better than Haste when it comes to melee damage (2x speed)?

Your argument against training skills to 22 (or lower levels, since you really don't need 27 skill) is "ash is better at gaming xp" (what does that imply about oka? does ash double your combat speed, and does every god need to be as crazily overpowered as ash?) and "it isn't good in lategame", maybe you should explain that a little bit. How it it not good in the late game, and why do you just dismiss the opportunity to train magic and other skills, your wording is really just saying "this is bad" and expecting us to be convinced. Do you have a lot of experience with Okawaru on low-aptitude races, because obviously Heroism is even better there, and only playing Minotaurs or something might affect your impression.

Finally, what is wrong with gods not being consistently powerful? Many other gods have different power levels at different points in the game. You would need to fundamentally change the way crawl approaches balance and the difficulty game before "oka gets weaker late, this is bad" becomes a good argument.

Whoa there, my rebuttals have never been "this is bad lololol".

Using haste and finesse, of course I know of that, but why go through the tedium, honestly, when I can just use what is slightly better over all?

I've played nothing but Oka games for the passed 4 months (I'm not sure why though...) so I do have a bit of experience with him, and EVERY game I feel as though something is lacking. And if what is lacking can only be replaced by spells... well.... somethings wrong with that design.

Trog is a good example of a simple god, that covers all the bases, has immense flavor and everything just falls into place perfectly.

Okawaru is simply missing a "trump" card, so to speak.... and if you'd imply that Finesse is that trump card then I'd have to vehemently disagree with you.

While I don't expect every god to be consistently powerful or usable in the late/post game I find it to be a huge issue when a god isn't feasible to even reach Zot half the time with out relying on non-god tools (not saying that about Oka, but just a general statement).


Edit: In short what I'm saying is: what's the point of worshiping a god that does nothing for you that you couldn't do yourself?
More exp? Great, but I could've been worshipping Ash. Double combat speed? Cool, but I can almost achieve that with Haste and actually worship a god that ... does something, for lack of verboseness.

There's a reason Okawaru is nick-named Chokowaru and isn't not just due to "Cap+0 {god-gift}" either....

[Wahaha]

As far as his other abilities go - they're not really that great... They're practical to a point.

Heroism is like Ash boost but better and you get it at 1 * and don't need to curse anything. It's incredibly good in so many ways throughout the game. Finesse is better than haste whenever you want to hit something with a weapon which happens pretty often. You can use both at the same time anyway. Finesse gives contam btw. Overall, Okawaru is stronger than many gods in many cases.

I don't care much about flavor but I think that for a god of war, an ability that makes you better at all aspects of fighting and an ability that makes you hit twice as fast are pretty appropriate and flavorful, while summoning a permanent dude to help you is questionable in flavor and simply bad when we think of issues other than flavor. Oka doesn't need flavor gimmicks.

[mumra]

While I don't expect every god to be consistently powerful or usable in the late/post game I find it to be a huge issue when a god isn't feasible to even reach Zot half the time with out relying on non-god tools

Emphasis mine.

Would you not describe melee combat as a "non-god tool"? How do you categorise what is and isn't a non-god tool? Is movement a non-god tool?

The point is gods are supposed to supplement the things your character can do. Of course your character has to actually do some stuff to reach Zot. You are lucky if you're even reaching it half the time without using "non-god tools"...

[battaile]

Finesse - again awesome ability, but once an Oka worshiper finds a book with haste in it is there really a point to finesse? Granted not every oka worshiper would be able to learn haste, but honestly, it's not that difficult to make it even as a melee character.

Oka Gifts - slightly worse than acquirement - still obviously has it's uses, until it just becomes floor clutter and more annoying than useful.

From my experience I'd disagree with both of these. I don't play Oka that much, but I had a 4 rune win with him in which I was decked out almost exclusively in god-gifted gear, and finished with a fully charged wand of haste in my inventory because I was able to use Finesse. Yes he gifts some crap but I never found it annoying, even near the end it was always kind of a scratch-the-lotto-ticket moment which enhanced my enjoyment of the game.

Given that I was very heavily relying on his gifts and Finesse, I don't see him as being lacking for non-extended, and the numbers would seem to bear that out. (As of this writing, more than twice the wins of any god besides Trog in the current tournament)

[Kate]

If I'm worshiping something and what is being offered becomes obsolete something's wrong.

It is not an issue if some god abilities, say, stop being useful when your skills get to 27. Oka certainly isn't particularly interesting but you are making a bunch of nonsense claims here and your base assumptions are wrong.

[RNG_god]

While I don't expect every god to be consistently powerful or usable in the late/post game I find it to be a huge issue when a god isn't feasible to even reach Zot half the time with out relying on non-god tools

Emphasis mine.

Would you not describe melee combat as a "non-god tool"? How do you categorise what is and isn't a non-god tool? Is movement a non-god tool?

The point is gods are supposed to supplement the things your character can do. Of course your character has to actually do some stuff to reach Zot. You are lucky if you're even reaching it half the time without using "non-god tools"...

Semantics?

Obviously I don't mean melee and movement, but this god basically is like a Choko.

The ability to save some EXP and the speed up combat. There's no REAL reason to worship Oka unless you really hate investing in haste (which is almost as good) and for some reason really like Heroism (I wonder who actually does...)

There's a design and flavor issue.

If I'm worshiping something and what is being offered becomes obsolete something's wrong.

It is not an issue if some god abilities, say, stop being useful when your skills get to 27. Oka certainly isn't particularly interesting but you are making a bunch of nonsense claims here and your base assumptions are wrong.

How is that a good thing? Uselss god abilities? Maybe we should have a god who's final ability is to recreate the effects of scroll of random uselessness.

[Arrhythmia]

It takes as much experience to go from 22 to 27 in a skill as it does to go from 0 to 22 in a completely different skill. You can use heroism to reach 27 in a skill when generally it is prohibitively expensive to do so.

[Kate]

How is that a good thing? Uselss god abilities? Maybe we should have a god who's final ability is to recreate the effects of scroll of random uselessness.

If you genuinely can't figure out how abilities can scale and be more or less useful at different times and how this is a totally fine thing to exist then probably your game design insight is not going to have much attention paid to it.

[dpeg]

I understand the desire to modify Okawaru. In fact, the thread DavionFuxa linked contains a quite specific idea of mine for how to make the gifting component more interesting (by letting Okawaru enchant items, including randarts).

However! There are really good reasons why everyone but the OP is against allies. Please read the replies in this thread, and in the other one, too. I will not list them again. For the record, one developer (keskitalo) championed the concept of having strong allies + healing as a potential Elyvilon playing style (the challenge is that the healer god doesn't like allies dying, so you have to keep them alive -- this triggered hydra summons, by the way).

Regarding the power curve: I agree that it's cool if a god has a signature power (something really strong and flavourful, like Lugonu's Corruption or Zin's Sanctuary). Okawaru doesn't, but (1) the gifts keep coming, so there's something to keep you entertained throughout, and (2) Okawaru is a great god to survive the early game, where survival is hardest.

[some12fat2move]

Using haste and finesse, of course I know of that, but why go through the tedium, honestly, when I can just use what is slightly better over all?

A finessed character does a whopping 33% more damage than a merely hasted character. If you are dismissing finesse because haste is "slightly better over all" you're doing it wrong.

[Mankeli]

The ability to save some EXP and the speed up combat. There's no REAL reason to worship Oka unless you really hate investing in haste (which is almost as good) and for some reason really like Heroism (I wonder who actually does...)

(Very) heavy armour makes investing in haste a lot more expensive. Oka wrath is one of the easiest to survive if going for extented compared to, say, Trog (I assume no wrath-scumming). Oka also allows magic training. Heroism is really nice early on and eventhough people complain about the shitty armour gifts shower you, in my experience, WILL get at least one piece of useful armour from Okie before zot + a blessable weapon of the best base type your char is using. And BTW the time most your skills are at 27 you've probably already won.

There's a design and flavor issue.

You are constantly mixing these by claiming that Oka is underpowered compared to the most owerpowered deities in Crawl and then claiming that this has something to do with flavour or something.

How is that a good thing? Uselss god abilities? Maybe we should have a god who's final ability is to recreate the effects of scroll of random uselessness.

Or maybe we should have forum posters with less hyperbole? Many posters above have rationally and calmly explained to you why some of your statements do not seem to be correct. This has nothing to do with "contrarian attitude".

[mumra]

Semantics?

Obviously I don't mean melee and movement, but this god basically is like a Choko.

No, it totally wasn't obvious. I'm not at all sure where you draw a line between god tools, non-god tools, and ... other?

As a player you have a range of tools at your disposal. This includes weapons, armour/jewellery, skills, natural abilities, movement/positioning, consumables, misc items, spells, and of course god powers (and notice that these are a very small subset of that total group; saying "non-god tools" literally means everything else in the game).

The game presents you the challenge of finding a way to use all of these tools in particular combinations that will win the game. Limiting yourself to less than the sum total of the available tools is in fact presenting yourself with a challenge condition. There's no harm in that, but don't complain that the game is too hard in those conditions. This would be a bit like getting given a straw in a fast food restaurant then complaining that the cup has a lid anyway.

[pratamawirya]

for some reason really like Heroism (I wonder who actually does...)

I do, since it's simple, useful, and really cheap.

[yogaFLAME]

I feel like asking someone's opinion on how powerful heroism is can be my new litmus test for if I should listen to any more of their opinions.

(it is exceptionally powerful and the singular reason one would want to pick Oka)

[Sandman25]

It takes as much experience to go from 22 to 27 in a skill as it does to go from 0 to 22 in a completely different skill. You can use heroism to reach 27 in a skill when generally it is prohibitively expensive to do so.

  Code:

 const int exp[28] = { 0, 50, 150, 300, 500, 750,         // 0-5
                          1050, 1400, 1800, 2250, 2800,      // 6-10
                          3450, 4200, 5050, 6000, 7050,      // 11-15
                          8200, 9450, 10800, 12300, 13950,   // 16-20
                          15750, 17700, 19800, 22050, 24450, // 21-25
                          27000, 29750 };

29750-17700=12050 which is very close to 19 (12300). Still a good point of course.

[Sandman25]

I feel like asking someone's opinion on how powerful heroism is can be my new litmus test for if I should listen to any more of their opinions.

(it is exceptionally powerful and the singular reason one would want to pick Oka)

Sorry, I failed your test. I take Oka for
1) Missile Gifts
2) Finesse
3) Weapon Gifts
4) Armour Gifts
5) Heroism

PS. Sorry for offtop.

[pratamawirya]

Oh yeah, missile gifts. The OP didn't even touch that aspect when he said this:

Oka Gifts - slightly worse than acquirement - still obviously has it's uses, until it just becomes floor clutter and more annoying than useful.

I take Oka for
1) Missile Gifts
2) Finesse
3) Weapon Gifts
4) Armour Gifts
5) Heroism

To me, missile gifts aren't as important as Heroism, since every class/combo benefits from Heroism, whereas you don't always want to go the ranged combat route (regardless of how strong it is). Even for an exec axe wielding Mi with good combat aptitudes, Heroism is still quite useful.

[Arrhythmia]

It takes as much experience to go from 22 to 27 in a skill as it does to go from 0 to 22 in a completely different skill. You can use heroism to reach 27 in a skill when generally it is prohibitively expensive to do so.

  Code:

 const int exp[28] = { 0, 50, 150, 300, 500, 750,         // 0-5
                          1050, 1400, 1800, 2250, 2800,      // 6-10
                          3450, 4200, 5050, 6000, 7050,      // 11-15
                          8200, 9450, 10800, 12300, 13950,   // 16-20
                          15750, 17700, 19800, 22050, 24450, // 21-25
                          27000, 29750 };

29750-17700=12050 which is very close to 19 (12300). Still a good point of course.

Apologies, I was looking for this very thing but couldn't find it. If I trust the wiki again it'll be too soon.

[Grimm]

OP: viewtopic.php?f=8&t=7178, holmes

[Sandman25]

To me, missile gifts aren't as important as Heroism, since every class/combo benefits from Heroism, whereas you don't always want to go the ranged combat route (regardless of how strong it is). Even for an exec axe wielding Mi with good combat aptitudes, Heroism is still quite useful.

It's personal preference I think. I take Oka for ranged characters only as you might guess (CeHu, HEAE).

[Lasty]

The ability to save some EXP and the speed up combat. There's no REAL reason to worship Oka . . .

What you describe as "no REAL reason to worship Oka" is something almost every other player would consider a good reason to do anything in Crawl whatsoever. Speeding up your attacks in combat and getting massive free XP are both incredibly good powers. If you doubt that, ask yourself this: which potions would you rather have than a potion of experience? Which wands would you rather have than a wand of hasting?

How is {some gods being useful early in the game rather than late} a good thing?

The early game is non-trivial for a lot of characters. These characters are best helped by Okawaru. In a 3-rune game, Okawaru's Heroism is the difference between having three skills at 27 and having 5 physical skills at 27, or having 3 physical skills at 27 and also being able to cast Controlled Blink or both Haste and Shadow Creatures (for example). Further, Heroism makes those skills that you get to 27 reach 27 much, much sooner.

If you believe that all other gods are good for a post-3-rune game, consider the following: Fedhas, Yredremnul, Sif, Lugonu, and arguably some of the others. For these gods, significant portions of their appeal become useless or next-to-useless in the extended game, but they are quite good (or at least decent) at helping you progress through a 3 rune game.

but this god basically is like a Choko.

Okawaru is like a quick-to-eat, low-nutrition permafood item? What is that supposed to mean?

[khalil]

but this god basically is like a Choko.

Okawaru is like a quick-to-eat, low-nutrition permafood item? What is that supposed to mean?

It's a ref to the Choko's description: bland.
He is very bland.

[Grimm]

The logic seems to run: Okawaru is the God of War. War is exciting and dangerous. Therefore Okawaru should be exciting and dangerous. Find the unexpressed assumption there and you have the error.

[prozacelf]

Oka is more the God of Preparing for War. By cleaning out the armory and donating the obsolete garbage to petitioners. Or by using powerful buffs ahead of time, but clearly inventory management is dear to Oka's heart.

[mumra]

We could clear up all the confusion by renaming to Chokowaru.

[Igxfl]

You eat the Chokowaru {god gift}.
That tasted especially warlike!
You are no longer hungry.

[snow]

i've always seen oka a weaker trog for combinations that can't go trog

trog gives you an early demon weapon/exe axe/whatever, usually with high enchantment, while oka gives you floor trash.
trog gives berserk which is better than heroism if you know how to use it right.
trog gives BIA. while zerk/hero and gifts can be compared, BIA just makes trog blow oka out of the water.

at the very best oka is like trog without BIA. i guess you could use spells? it feels like at that point you're actively trying to find some alternate challenge route where you waste tons of xp to get some utility spells that almost make up for not having BIA.

imo oka would be better if heroism was passive and the whole gifting thing was reworked. also BIA could use a nerf maybe...

[nordetsa]

+5 skill level passive sounds like overpowered version of Ashenzari skill boost. I think heroism is fine compared to berserk. It doesn't get you exhausted and slowed, and you can cast it several times without worrying too much.

I do feel gifting system can be made better. Like making him not giving +0 wizard hat is or +0 animal skin (I think making him give those is an insult to the God of War).

[njvack]

at the very best oka is like trog without BIA. i guess you could use spells?

Yes, I think that if you choose Oka over Trog you would probably want to use spells.

On the upside, you've freed up a bunch of XP to train them because you get a real cheap +5 to your combat skills whenever you want.

[Lasty]

trog > okawaru

It's interesting that you don't even mention Finesse when discussing Okawaru, despite the fact that it's a huge boost to both melee and ranged combat skills (try berserking with a crossbow). It's also interesting that you see allowing spells as a meaningless detail in the comparison of the two gods, especially considering how many people have already expressly mentioned how Okawaru's Heroism skill boost saves a ton of XP that can be dumped into spells.

It sounds to me like the heart of your issues with Okawaru is that you don't enjoy the benefits which Okawaru provides. That's fine. I don't really like Nemelex, despite Nemelex being super-powerful.

[TeshiAlair]

Ok some summarizing.

1. Oka is quite numerically good, but boring.
2. Missile gifts are good, other gifts are believed to be lackluster.
3. He is considered one of the better gods for hybrid characters.

My personal dislikes:

4. I don't like that he's an invocations god with non-flashy effects.
5. I don't think his abilities are super-thematic.

Suggestions:

1. Make his abilities passive and scale on both combat duration and number of enemies. The longer/more difficult the fight, the higher your skills get temporarily, with a non-immediate scale down so that you are rewarded for charging into the next room right away. This would encourage more epic battles and remove some tedium.

2. This one is a bit kitschy but make him change (t) shout into Battle Cry: give you a mild buff of some kind, or have a fear effect on intelligent enemies.

3. Make his weapon/armor gifts start out at +0/+0 but give them an ability that buffs them whenever you kill a yellow/red enemy or a unique. This way, his gifts can feel more satisfying, and have a different niche than Trog's

[crate]

personally I think it is good that oka is "boring". He's supposed to be simple and manages that quite well. If you want a more complex god, you can check out the other gods that are in crawl, many of them will fit what you want.

[TeshiAlair]

By that logic Sludge Elves should have been left in. Almost every boring species has been either removed or made more interesting. Why should gods be immune, particularly when there are so few of them.

[crate]

Well sludge elves were basically humans except slightly less interesting. There is no other god who is basically okawaru except more interesting.