I am a big fan of DCSS, though I am not very good, and I have been wondering about what kind of feature I’d like to add to contribute to the game. While on a walk I happened to think about Avatar: The Last Airbender and how that could lend itself to crawl. To that end I came up with an idea for what I think is a potentially fun UC focused god that Claude I am calling Quilvash. So far this is the setup I have created and am currently play testing.
Parts of this may be OP, I’m still working on ideas for what abilities you get for pip 5/6 of piety but I think the current setup feels fun and has good incentives to skipping UC combat in favor of a un/randart.
One area I haven’t given this too much thought is how forms/talismans play into this or how this in combo with certain spells might make it broken. Maybe forms can be solved by the god disliking transformations.
Below is a summary of the piety levels and what abilities are unlocked. Still thinking through piety costs and how quickly it is gained back.
Summary:
4 “bending” types (taken directly from the show) Air,Water( Ice in DCSS ), Fire, Earth.
Piety levels and rewards:
Pip 1: you get to pick one of the 4 bending types. This bestows a passive UC brand:
- Fire - Flaming
- Water - Freezing
- Earth - Protection
- Air - Speed
Pip 2: you get an resistance based on type
- Fire - rF+
- Water - rC+
- Earth - rPois
- Air - rElec
Pip 3: gain an ego and apt changes to +1 for themed spell skill (like how draconians work)
- Fire - Fire ego and a boost to fire magic apt
- Water - Ice ego and a boost to ice magic apt
- Earth - Earth ego and a boost to earth magic apt
- Air - Air ego and a boost to Air magic apt
Pip 4: More resists based on type
- Fire - rF+ (now rF++)
- Water - rC+ (now rC++)
- Earth - rCorr (now rPois + rCorr)
- Air - rN++ (now rElec + rN++)
Pip 5: Berserk like ability which costs a lot of piety that gives the berserk like boosts ( hp gain, might, but no haste ) and a modifier based on bender type which wears off after a timer but can be extended and has a cooldown:
- Fire - “inferno” - punches inflict “sticky flame” instead of flaming brand
- Water - “blizzard” - punches inflict “hailstorm” instead of freezing
- Earth - “earthquake” - punches inflict “petrify” instead of freezing
- Air - “Hurricane” - punches inflict “airstrike” instead of speed
Pip 6: Avatar state - on activation a top level spell from the school matching the players bending is instantly cast then for 15 turns they get all the pip 1 brands except their main bending where they get the pip 5 “brand”. Using this brings them all the way down to min(pip 5) and can only be used when at max piety.
- Fire - instant cast “ignition”, they get the freezing+protection+speed brand and “Sticky flame” is cast on their punch targets
- Water - instant cast “polar vortex”, they get the flaming+protection+speed brand and “hailstorm” is cast on their punch targets
- Earth - instant cast “shatter”, they get the flaming+freezing+speed brand and “petrify” is cast on their punch targets
- Air - instant cast “chain lightning”, they get the flaming+freezing+protection brand and “airstrike” is cast on their punch targets