Wu Jian

Version 0.32: This article is up to date for the latest stable release of Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup.

"Follow the Path!"

The Wu Jian Council is a congregation of martial monks, ascended to divinity after battling their way out of the afterlife. Disciples of the Council are able to execute acrobatic martial maneuvers, such as wall jumps, spinning attacks and punishing lunges. They will eventually become able to request help in the form of a storm of heavenly clouds. Followers unlock these abilities through practice, so they do not benefit from training Invocations. The god revolves around three "martial attacks" and the interactions between them. The player is incentivized to use these special attacks in difficult fights, and they're designed to prevent any of the three from being overcentralizing or optimal for any particular build.

Racial restrictions

Demigods cannot worship the Wu Jian Council (or any other god).

Appreciates

Wu Jian likes it when you kill living beings, you destroy the undead, you kill demons, you kill holy beings and you destroy nonliving beings.

Deprecates

• Inactivity: You lose 1 piety per 340 turns, on average (1/17 chance every 20 turns).
• Abandonment.

Martial Attacks

Wu Jian's first three abilities rely on movement, and attack with your weapon (or fists). There isn't a 1-to-1 relation between moving and attacking. Instead, movement takes the usual amount of time, and you'll swing a # of times based on how fast you attack and how much time you spend moving.

For example, a normal speed character moves at 1.0 decaAut. If you have an attack delay of 0.7, you'll always perform 1 attack on a move (taking 0.7 / 1.0 of the time), and have a 3/7 (0.3 remaining / 0.7) chance for a 2nd attack.

• All martial attacks and Serpent's Lash make you immune to attacks of opportunity.
• Axes do not cleave when used in martial attacks.

Given Abilities

Piety level (-): "Young Dog"

• Lunge: Triggered by moving directly towards an enemy, dealing 120% the damage of a normal attack. Only the 8 normal movement directions count (ie. does not trigger on enemies a chess knight's move away).

Piety level (*): "Young Crane"

• Whirlwind: Triggered by moving from a tile adjacent to an enemy to another tile adjacent to it, dealing 80% the damage of a normal attack. If a movement has multiple targets for whirlwinds and lunges, all of them are struck.

Piety level (**): "Young Tiger"

• Wall Jump: Triggered by using the active ability while standing against a wall. If there is a clear landing site two squares in the opposite direction, you will vault over, attacking all enemies adjacent to the landing site. This movement takes twice as much time as a normal move, and inflicts twice as many attacks.

Piety level (***): "Young Dragon"

• Serpent's Lash: Instant ability. Causes your next two movement actions (or one wall jump) to be instant, and boosts your martial attacks by 40% (stacks multiplicatively) during them. In addition, martial attacks can never miss. You are considered to be moving at 10 aut for the purposes of attacking. Stairs don't count as movement, so you will go up/down at normal speed and not use a charge. (2-3 piety, exhaustion)

Piety level (****): "Red Sash"

• No new abilities.

Piety level (*****): "Golden Sash"

• Heavenly Storm: Grants the player a two-tile halo (revealing you if invisible) and summons a storm of opaque golden clouds that follow you around, creating loud noises in the process. During the effect, you get a hefty slaying and EV bonus: it starts at 5, and increases by 1 for every target struck by a martial attack (to a maximum of 15). It decays by 1 every 2-3 turns. Once it reaches 0, the ability ends. (20-30 Piety)

• Heavenly Storm ignores how many actual attacks you did per move, just your movement and targets hit per movement.

Piety level (******): "Sifu"

• No new abilities.

Penance

Those who turn against the Council must be prepared to endure death by a thousand cuts. No hiding place is secure, no disguise perfect enough to avoid the sudden spring of traps, the flying daggers and the armies of animated weapons that will ambush the betrayer.

Being under penance while worshipping Wu Jian results in the title "Wooden Rat". Upon abandoning Wu Jian the penance counter is set at 25. Punishments include summoning various branded dancing weapons & applying a debuff (barbs, slow, silence or stat drain & corrosion). Barbs debuff is accompanied by a dagger of electrocution, slow is accompanied by a quarterstaff of speed, & silence is accompanied by a dire flail of flaming.

Strategy

Wu Jian is a positioning heavy, mostly melee god. When compared to gods like Okawaru or Trog, the Council offers relatively few benefits to raw combat. Instead, the martial attacks and Serpent's Lash increase the effectiveness of movement, and it helps you avoid attacks of opportunity. Serpent's Lash should be your main go-to, as it has a cheap piety cost. You can either use it as a combat tool (2 free attacks at 140%+ power) or as a simple escape ability.

If you want to fight multiple enemies, find ways to create gaps in their formation. Status effects, Translocations, summons, or just killing monsters will give you spaces to perform martial attacks in. Heavy armoured characters who can use martial tactics and those abilities in conjunction will appreciate the presence of WJC.

Heavenly Storm is a great crowd-control tool. When used correctly, it makes floors like Vaults:5 and Zot:5 much easier to deal with. The fog prevents crowds from getting too out of control, while the combat bonuses do mean a lot. Even though it costs a lot of piety, don't shy away from this ability. If you drop to 4*, you'll still have access to Serpent's Lash.

Stabbers may find the Council an interesting choice of god; martial attacks allow a character to stab multiple enemies while moving. Lunge lets you use paralysis or Ensorcelled Hibernation from a distance and guarantee you can stab them before they wake up. Serpent's Lash combined with Lunge lets you sleep stab enemies from up to 4 tiles away.

Tips and Tricks

• Despite resembling a cleaving attack, Wall Jump will not target invisible enemies.
• You do not have to perform the two instant movements of Serpent's Lash one after another; if you don't move from your spot, the game will progress as normal, and your Lash will be maintained.
• Using Serpent's Lash during Heavenly Storm will let you build up your slaying bonus without letting it decay.
• Heavenly Storm also makes for a great escape/ninjaing ability; the perpetual fog provides fantastic cover, while martial attacks and Serpent's Lash let you weave through enemy crowds with great agility.

History

• Prior to 0.31, you couldn't make martial attacks if rampaging would activate.
• Prior to 0.27, Heavenly Storm did not grant bonus EV, and was a bit louder.
• Prior to 0.25, Whirlwind pinned enemies in place for one turn. Heavenly storm had no cap, but decayed faster (much faster at higher bonuses), and the bonus increased by 2 per martial attack and 1 per normal attack.
• The Wu Jian Council was added in 0.21.