The Deities ; Thoughts on the Final Roster

[The Avatar]

I think you could make the individual god preps add that altar if you we're forced to worship them first or they were made undesecratable. Still, it's probably too late in the game for that.

[Minaro]

Poor Mystery and Taurog, they're definately my least used gods.

Mystery simply because she brings very small benefits short of Piety farming, even for Wizards or other spellcasters (which is saying a lot). Flames is practically NEVER a good option, since you want/need to make normal attacks 99% of the dungeon runs, you'd need to have a very, very specific dungeon setup screw you over to make the trade worthwhile. After all, even with no base damage bonuses, 50% is 25 damage at level 10. Add in the huge amounts of things you can do to increase your damage output and/or just get more hits in, you'd need to be able to get atleast 3-4 fireballs in for every regular attack you make. Well, I guess that I atleast use Mystery here more than in the Alpha. In the Alpha worshopping her would've been forfeiting the game most of the time.

Then there's Taurog.. Taurog is an inventory hogger, with items that are generally worse than a lot of your shop alternatives, thus leaving you weaker if you actually use them, or atleast if you get good shops. Even in the right circumstances, using up that many slots seriously limits your choices. Even if you have the potential to use glyphs since his penalty isn't *that* bad if you're just gonna use them for catapults, you don't have enough inventory space. This is probably one of the biggest issues, Taurog both leaves you (mostly) unable to use glyphs - not primarily because of losing mana or piety, but because you lack space to keep them - AND unable to use more items. It desperately limits your choices, to the point where you often find yourself off much worse with than without him.

Now, there's a truckload of ways to go to make Mystery better, so I won't go there. On the other hand, a simple yet ridiculously effective way to make Taurog better would be to make all/some/most of his items small - you could use Taurogs boons and equipment yet still have more room for other things, be they glyphs or other items. That'd shift his limitations more towards what I feel they should be - spellcasting. The current loss of Max mana is already going a long way towards making you weaker.

[Darvin]

Mystery simply because she brings very small benefits short of Piety farming, even for Wizards or other spellcasters (which is saying a lot)

Have you tried Refreshment? It's her saving grace, and is especially good for Goblins, Gnomes, and (in a pinch) elves.

Flames is practically NEVER a good option

Agreed; I only ever use it for Assassins. Just like in the alpha, they're the only ones who can actually handle having their attack neutered like that.

It desperately limits your choices, to the point where you often find yourself off much worse with than without him (Taurog).

Yes, you need to be planning carefully when playing with Taurog. Compression seals are a big help. You can also resist-stack with his items, taking only the resistance-boosting item that corresponds to the boss you want to fight by attrition.

While I'm totally with you on what Taurog needs, Minaro, the devs disagree. I've been talking about Taurog's problems for well over a year now, and if the developers were inclined to make a sweeping change they would have done so long ago. At this point, only minor tweaks will be happening.

[The Avatar]

It really is a shame. I think Taurog should have been remade, but I guess how focused in he is helps new players.

[q 3]

Maybe we should have deity veto slots.

[Gavster]

Mystera can help you double fireball early, I find it useful in conjunction with wehtwuht, if you find both early enough.
Extra xp and opening spaces is nothing to spite. Converting into tikki tokki at 50 piety will let you pick up another xp per kill and dodge. Wehtwuht is better with jehora but crap early game starts can be flipped around. Wehtwuht let's you utilise space better.

I kind of agree with the devs on taurog. It took me so long to leverage tikki tokki properly, earth mother messed up my killing the boss so many times and gg I'm still average at. If they improved Taurog they'd have to ruin his learning curve viability.

When Taurog is your only option and you don't have fireball, he can be useful. Drop 2-3 early glyphs and you can pick up +5 dmg. At level 1 it let's you catapult early. And if you don't mind the mana loss you can buy and leave items on the floor for +5% bonus dmg, much better to jump gods though, especially if you find fireball. He's a beast at picking up piety for melee classes. Pactmakers best friend.

[Lujo]

Really guys, the whole "Taurog should be remade" thing is pro's wanting stuff to cater to them. Taurog wins runs on his own before you unlock anything else, even the basic stuff you start auto-prepping once you've unlocked anything else. Yeah, he's not optimal in the super-late endgame (allthough he's part of the most extreme strat possible, so yeah on that), but he's really, really, really fool-proof easy to use and he's not in fact lacking in power as much as not as powerfull compared to stuff that we somehow feel entitled to but only a handfull of people in the world can unlock and figure out on their own anyway...

The game is too hard for the average human being, so they were given an overpowered newbie crutch to keep them from quitting on time. Lets not whine because we cant keep using it as effectively once we unlock even more retarded stuff.

[Minaro]

Mystery simply because she brings very small benefits short of Piety farming, even for Wizards or other spellcasters (which is saying a lot)

Have you tried Refreshment? It's her saving grace, and is especially good for Goblins, Gnomes, and (in a pinch) elves.

Of course I've tried it Problem is that short of picking up Refreshment and possibly one or two Mana upgrades, she has nothing else to really bring to the table. Many other gods have incentives to keep worshipping them, but Mystera's only appealing repeatable favor (Mana) goes up in cost far too quickly.

Refreshment is also still very weak for being the biggest thing she has going for her. I can't think of any scenario of using her when I wouldn't just go in, get a mana upgrade or two, possibly refreshment just to convert out into the very next *useful* Diety I find..and that's only if I find her AND a good spammable glyph early.
Ironically though, she works surprisingly well for Berserkers, since they're the ones who find the most use for Mystic balance. For them, it'll lower the cost of nearly all glyphs by two, or atleast not increase their cost. Byceps would be the only one actually increasing in cost to a Berserker if I'm not mistaken.

[Darvin]

Ironically though, she works surprisingly well for Berserkers, since they're the ones who find the most use for Mystic balance

That is intentional. Assassins also get a lot of value out of Mystic Balance. Other characters really need to have WEYTWUT for it to shine, though.

Byceps would be the only one actually increasing in cost to a Berserker if I'm not mistaken.

BYSSEPS and LEMMISI, the latter of which berserkers will never use anyways.

[TigerKnee]

I don't think anybody wants Taurog to be both "insta-win early Kingdom" and "insta-win late Kingdom" but the important phrases "balanced"/"viable choice".

Maybe they should take more inspiration from the original DC's Trog, who is gamebreakingly powerful early in the DUNGEON but terrible end-game and a lot of Trog worshippers try to jump ship then.

I don't know how you would translate that though. Giving bonuses that are uber at level 1 but become super weak at 10? Shrug.