0.18

Trunk-only: This article pertains to a feature of Crawl which is being tested. It will likely change before the next release, and may even be removed entirely.

Stone Soup 0.18 (up to 0.18-a0-1126-ga2d7f46)

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Highlights

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• New god: Pakellas the Inventive.

Branches, Environment

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• Ziggurat portals no longer appear in Pan.
• The Orcish Mines are now two levels, and only spawn plain orcs as part of bands; gold generation is doubled to account for the shorter branch.
• The Elven Halls now contains elementals and dancing weapons (in addition to the ones normally found in the Hall of Blades).

Character

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• A new mutation: Sturdy Frame, reducing base ER by 2/4/6 and thus making heavy armour easier to wear. Can be a demonspawn mutation.
• The player no longer takes an accuracy penalty for fighting while invisible but without SInv (also true of monsters).
• Formicids now have 0 Throwing aptitude (was -2).
• Taking a known shaft now has a 2/3 chance of shafting one floor and 1/3 of two floors.
• Breath abilities are no longer mutations and are now unique to draconians and nagas.
• Weapon types no longer have distinct strength weights. Instead of dex and str both giving varying bonuses to damage, str now solely gives a bonus to-dam, and dex now solely gives a bonus to accuracy.

Gods

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• New god: Pakellas the Inventive. Pakellas is a temple god, with an altar either in Temple or on D:2-9.
  • Grants MP on kills (at about half the rate of Vehumet) and passive wand charge identification.
  • Blocks MP regeneration and hates channeling (staff of energy, crystal ball of energy, the Staff of Wucad Mu, and Sublimation of Blood).
  • Piety on kills.
  • 1*: Quick Charge: spend 2/3 your current MP pool to add some charges to a wand or rod proportional to your Evocations, your current MP pool, and the capacity of the device.
  • At 2*, Pakellas gifts you a wand once (of any type other than heal
  • 3*: Device Surge: on your next use of an evocable item, spends 1-9 MP to apply one to three enhancers to its power output, with maximum MP and number of enhancers dependent on piety.
  • Starting at 4*, Pakellas occasionally gifts rods, wands, and miscellaneous evokables (always starting with a rod unless you are a felid).
  • 6* capstone: Supercharge: sets a rod to +10 (18/18), or sets a wand's capacity to 50% above normal for that wand type (in addition to recharging it - this has the effect of improving Quick Charge's efficiency on the wand).
• Xom now chaos brands more weapon gifts, and can chaos brand ranged weapons again.
• Xom's random spell list has been adjusted slightly.
• Finesse is no longer blocked by stasis.
• Jiyva altars in Dungeon no longer appear as early in Dungeon.
• Cheibriados now blocks chaos effects from hasting the player.
• Piety given for a Ru sacrifice is more explicitly stated.
• Abandoning Yredelemnul now destroys your zombie minions.
• Followers of Elyvilon can pacify insects (again).
• Zin's Recite is now only interrupted if the player is silenced or incapacitated (or goes berserk).
• Gozag's Call Merchant now bases the shop quality on the player's level rather than on their location.

Items

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• New items:
  • The amulet of dismissal, which has a chance of teleporting away enemies that damage the player, but causes a few turns of vertigo (lowered accuracy, EV, and spell success) when first worn.
  • The amulet of reflection, which grants a few points of shielding that act as a shield of reflection.
  • The amulet of harm, which increases damage dealt to and by the wearer by 25%.
  • The amulet of magic regeneration, which increases the player MP regen rate after a warmup period.
  • The ring of resist corrosion, which has the same effect as the former amulet.
  • A figurine of a ziggurat - evoke to create a ziggurat portal. Appears on Zig:27 of all ziggurats and in the Tomb:3 loot.
  • Pieces from Xom's chessboard - evoke to randomly swap the positions of you and all enemies and LOS, or (on failure) to trigger a Xom effect.
  • Unrand: The +8 frozen axe "Frostbite" {freezing cloud, *Noise +Fly rC+}, an executioner's axe with a chance of placing freezing clouds on enemies it strikes.
  • Unrand: The +12 armour of Talos {ponderous, rF+}, a troll/ogre-sized suit of plate mail.
  • Unrand: The +3 Warlock's Mirror {reflection}, a buckler that allows reflection of piercing effects and enchantments, among other things.
• The robe of vines is now +2, Regen+7.
• The Majin-Bo now speaks occasionally.
• The amulet of Cekugob is now an amulet of dismissal.
• The brooch of Shielding is now a +8 amulet of reflection with no AC or EV bonus.
• Wearing an amulet of regeneration has no effect until the next time you are at full health.
• A new property can now generate on random artefacts: Fragile, which destroys the item when it is removed.
• Amulets of faith now grant a 25% bonus to piety, not a 33% bonus.
• Potions of ambrosia now bypass clarity.
• The evocable teleport property +Tele is removed. Rings of teleportation now only have the *Tele teleportitis effect.
• Potions of cure mutation are slightly more common.
• Removed items:
  • Amulets of resist mutation, stasis, warding, and corrosion.
  • Ring of invisibility.
  • Potions of degeneration.

Monsters

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• New monsters:
  • Spark wasps, lethally electric swarming insects that appear singularly in Spider and in packs in Depths.
  • Iron giants, with all the resilience that iron implies and the ability to throw you into the pack of giants they lead.
  • Doom hounds, demonic canines lurking in Tartarus who can howl once to create a pack of nasty creatures.
  • Deep elf archers, who have attained a notable level of skill in both archery and hexes.
  • Deep elf elementalists, with mastery of all of the elemental schools and the noted ability to turn rock into earth elementals to dig out entrenched foes.
• Chaos champions lose Chaotic Mirror and instead gain Call of Chaos, an ability which applies (usually) positive status effects to allies in its line of sight.
• Mnoleg gains Call of Chaos (as above), Random Bolt, and Dig.
• Gloorx Vloq gains Summon Executioners and Black Mark.
• Salamander stormcallers' chant does not need to be continuous; they now only need to try to cast Fire Storm at their target three times for it to trigger.
• Entropy weavers' corrosion is now instant and smite-targeted, but only applies one level of corrosion.
• Ice devils are now tier 4 demons, with lowered HD to match.
• Hellwings now have the swoop attack formerly possessed by blue devils.
• Orange demons have their attacks split - they now have a reaching poison sting and a melee-only weakness attack.
• Salamander mystics lose Localised Ignite Poison.
• Natasha, deep elf knights, and salamander stormcallers can no longer cast Conjure Flame.
• Banishment from powerful monsters can now send you deeper into the Abyss than Abyss:1.
• Deep elf mages are now HD 9 and have new spell sets, including spells previously cast by deep elf conjurers and summoners.
• The Sap Magic effect from demonspawn warmongers now has three fixed levels of success rate penalty, rather than scaling continuously. Each spell cast while under the Sap effect has a fixed chance to increase the penalty level. The penalty now expires when the "Sap" status expires.
• Demonspawn corruptors' Corrupt Body spell is now a single-target version of the same spell used by wretched stars. These spells both now try to apply multiple levels of a single random temporary mutation instead of giving many different kinds.
• Ancient champions and death knights no longer have the Haunt spell.
• Swamp worms are now amphibious and generate submerged, emerging to attack the player and never resubmerging.
• Deep elf high priests now have an Aura of Brilliance spell that affects all allies in their view, making them cast spells more frequently and with more spell power.
• Natasha no longer becomes weaker upon revival.
• Removed monsters:
  • Octopode crushers.
  • (Plain) spiders.
  • Salamander firebrands.
  • Blue devils.
  • Brain worms.
  • Deep elf fighters, conjurers, priests, and summoners.
  • Trapdoor spiders.

Spells

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• New spell: Yara's Violent Unravelling (L5 Hexes/Transumations). Dispels all cancellable effects on the target and, if any were dispelled, causes a damaging explosion of mutagenic energy around the victim.
• Hydra Form now has a fixed number of heads.
• The Infusion spell has a lower power cap, scaling more quickly to the same damage bonus as before.
• Spectral Weapon now bases the strength of the summoned weapon on spell power instead of weapon skill.
• Alistair's Intoxication is now level 5 and gives Vertigo status instead of confusing the player or draining Int, and can sometimes affect rPois monsters.
• Monstrous Menagerie is now level 7.
• Shadow creatures is now level 6.

Interface

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• Earth elementalists now have their stones start on b.
• Characters starting with a primary ranged weapon now have their melee weapon on b by default.
• An option is added to the butchering prompt to allow butchering only (e)dible corpses.
• Auto-eat now triggers for ghouls if they are rotted.
• The religion screen now shows all god powers, with currently accessible powers (per level of piety) being highlighted.
• Many previously hardcoded forced mores are now optional and present in the default init.txt.