Fedhas Madash

Version 0.30: This article may not be up to date for the latest stable release of Crawl.

"Spread life and death."

Fedhas is the god of plant and fungal life. Followers are forbidden from harming any species under Fedhas' protection. In return Fedhas grants a number of abilities that promote the growth of plant and fungi. These abilities may incidentally prove useful to adventurers. Plants and fungi will not attack Fedhas' worshippers without provocation. Fedhas' worshippers may walk through plants or fungi, and even fire missiles or spells through them without causing harm. Fedhas grants powers to temporarily grow a menagerie of plant allies whose strength and duration increase with Invocations skill. Worshipers may grow a protective wall of briar patches as well as ballistomycetes that fire damaging spores whose explosions confuse living creatures. Devout followers can overgrow a stretch of solid terrain with a cluster of plant allies or even summon a mighty oklob plant. Fedhas likes it when you kill living beings, you destroy the undead, you kill demons, you kill holy beings and you destroy nonliving beings. Fedhas dislikes it when you destroy plants.

Racial restrictions

Demigods are unable to worship Fedhas (or any other god). Also, characters who sacrificed love under Ru cannot join Fedhas.

Appreciates

• Killing natural, undead, demonic, holy, or nonliving creatures.

Deprecates

• Inactivity: You lose 1 piety per 700 turns, on average (1/35 chance every 20 turns).
• Attacking allied flora. (Piety loss)

Given abilities

Piety level -: "Fungal"

• All plants are peaceful towards you. In addition to stationary plants, sleepcaps, shambling mangroves, and thorn hunters will be peaceful. (Passive)
• You can walk through plants (but not trees, which are walls). It takes 50% longer than normal to do so. (Passive)
• Plants and trees are protected from harm. You can fire through all allied plant-type creatures as if they were a bush, and no attack or spell will harm a plant/tree, even with spells like Fireball. (Passive)
  • Entities created by spells, like orbs of destruction and battlespheres (including its beams), are unable to pass through plants.

Piety level *: "Green [Species]"

• No new abilities.

Piety level **: "Cultivator"

• Wall of Briars: Encircles yourself with summoned briar patches, which hurt any enemy that attacks them. Enemies can fire Ranged Weapons and other projectiles past the briars, though Hexes like Confuse can't pass through. It won't summon patches for enemies already next to you. (3 MP, 2-3 Piety)

Piety level ***: "Fruitful"

• Grow Ballistomycete: Summons a ballistomycete, at a chosen square up to 2 tiles away. Ballistomycetes create exploding spores, which deal 3d(6 + Invocations) damage and confuses creatures that are breathing. Spores can hit the player. (4 MP, 4-6 Piety)

Piety level ****: "Photosynthesist"

• Overgrow: Transforms dungeon walls and trees into plant allies by using the Overgrow ability. Once the plants despawn, the wall will be gone. This can override stone and metal walls. Higher Invocations will improve the selection of plants. (8 MP, 12-18 Piety)

Piety level *****: "Green Death"

• Grow Oklob: Grows an oklob plant, at a chosen square up to 2 tiles away. These are strong, long lasting, and corrosive allies. (6 MP, 6-9 Piety)

Higher Invocations increases the oklob's HP and firerate, but not damage. Oklob plants have a 25% + (2.5% * Invocations) chance to use Spit Acid each turn, if a target is in range.

Piety level ******: "Force of Nature"

• No new abilities.

Punishments

Fedhas does not appreciate abandonment, and will call down fearful punishments on disloyal followers! Those who offend Fedhas will have forces of nature invoked against them in the form of pure elemental destruction. Waves of ballistomycete spores will rise from nearby corpses, and the worst offenders will be surrounded by animate mushrooms and acid-spitting oklob plants. Fedhas's wrath lasts for a relatively short duration.

During penance, Fedhas will occasionally punish you with one of the following forms of divine retribution:

• The forces of nature will be invoked against you. This equates to a random Corrosive Bolt, Primal Wave, or Volley of Thorns.
• Corpses in line of sight will produce hostile spores.
• Hostile plants (biased towards oklobs) will grow around you. This effect will only happen when abandoning Fedhas, never when simply under penance.

All previously neutral or allied plants will also turn hostile upon abandonment or excommunication.

Strategy

Fedhas offers a strong variety of summons that you can fire through. The plants themselves are quite strong, remaining useful throughout a 3-rune game (at the least):

• Briar patches will prevent enemies from getting into melee range, but they can't block ranged attacks or most damaging spells. Still, Wall of Briars can make it easier to escape, break attacks of opportunity, and deal a fair bit of spiny damage to melee attackers. Also, being surrounded by briars makes it harder for enemies to surround you. Just beware that it takes 1.5 decaAut to pass through each plant.
  • Among other things, Wall of Briars can block trample and Harpoon Shot (you can't be pushed/pulled past the briars).
  • Briars can block Hexes, and hex-like spells such as malmutate. Great for preventing paralysis!
• Ballistomycetes inflict confusion, which by itself can take out many early/mid game enemies. Spores are very likely to confuse enemies, regardless of their willpower, HD, or poison resistance - it will even confuse Tiamat and the Hell lords. However, it doesn't do much against unbreathing (nonliving or undead) foes.
• Oklobs deal moderately high damage (which few monsters resist) and corrodes enemies, severely lowering their AC. The corrosion effect is strong in practice, and even stronger when considering that your plant allies also benefit.

As all invocable plants are both stationary and long lasting, try to place them where you can easily sustain fighting. Make sure you aren't blocking your plants! The end of a hallway is often a good location for oklobs. Meanwhile, ballistomycetes don't work well in cramped corridors; they produce spores that explode in a 3x3 radius, potentially harming you. In that case, you may want to kite a monster around a wall while your plants fire.

Tips & Tricks

• Spores will tend to track towards enemies, but are not perfect. The plant can be told to attack a specific target, but spores are unable to listen.
• Any plants you summon are considered to worship Fedhas, so your oklobs can fire through other plants. (Spores can't pass through, however.)
• Overgrowth is very expensive compared to Fedhas' other abilities. Its main use is to break through stone and metal walls, such the Slime:5 loot chambers or the lungs in Zot:5.

History

• Prior to 0.30, Fedhas did not protect trees. You would receive penance for destroying trees.
• Prior to 0.28, oklob plant's Spit Acid dealt less damage (3d7 + 2d4) to monsters, but oklobs fired faster.
• Prior to 0.27, many spells, like Fulminant Prism and Fire Storm, would harm plants in the process.
• Prior to 0.24, Fedhas did not allow the undead to worship it. Fedhas' abilities were greatly reworked in this version: the previous version revolved around permanent plants, terrain changes, and a direct ration cost. For more details, see this revision.
• Prior to 0.22, Evolution was granted at *, and Sunlight was granted at **.
• Prior to 0.21, Fedhas abilities used fruits rather than rations.
• Prior to 0.19, Fedhas didn't have piety decay.
• Prior to 0.15, worshipers of Fedhas could not cast Sublimation of Blood without incurring piety loss and/or penance.
• Prior to 0.8, Decomposition was accomplished as an ability, not through prayer.