Hi, crawlers! It’s been a while; those late summer doldrums, or late winter, for you strange people living upside-down. Whichever your preferred orientation, here’s the latest changes from trunk:

Monsters: Jellies no longer eat any items, even unseen ones, unless the player is worshipping Jiyva. Zombies, skeletons, &c now display damage taken (a health bar, etc), like other enemy types. Zombies are now named by their base type (e.g. ‘centaur warrior zombie’), rather than their base species (‘centaur zombie’). Necromancers’ Bind Souls now creates simulacra, not spectral things. This will, ideally, increase player deaths. The Ghostly Fireball monster spell is now pure negative energy, rather than being partially irresistible. It also now inflicts drain. Call of Chaos has had its effects reworked, and will no longer paralyse or petrify every monster in sight.

Spells: Spells you’ve seen monsters cast are now automatically tracked. This is useful for monsters with multiple spellbooks, which now list in their descriptions only those spellbooks that they might have (based on the spells you’ve seen). Pandemonium Lords also list the spells you’ve seen them cast. Spellbooks that the player walks onto or apports are now automatically identified, without needing to use the (r)ead command. Book amnesia (the ability to forget spells by destroying a book that contains them) has been forgotten, and also removed from the game. Paralysis and Confusion can no longer last for 50-100 turns when cast on monsters. (Players had, and have, a different formula that gives considerably shorter durations.) Warp Weapon and the Akashic Record have been removed.

Characters: rN has been reworked. Various effects (e.g. vampirism, pain) that were 100% resisted by a single level of rN now require 3 levels; rN provides 50%, 75%, and 100% immunity to them at rN+/++/+++, as with damage. The Agony effect now works like Torment, and goes down to 45%/40%/35% hp damage at rN+/++/+++. Stabbing has been simplified. There are now exactly two types of stabs: those against helpless (sleeping/paralysed/petrified) targets, and those against merely distracted targets. In effect, this is mainly a buff to petrification and distraction stabbing, at least for now. There is no longer an EV penalty for taking stairs, but the process of climbing/descending stairs now takes slightly longer. Sustain Attributes (the ring, Dg innate, etc) is no more. Most stat-draining effects have been reduced to compensate. Mutations no longer rot the undead, but only cause stat-draining. The mummy Self-Restoration ability has rotted away.

Gods: Most gods that require kills for piety are now less picky, and will accept kills of any monster type, including nonliving monsters and plants. (TSO and Zin remain exceptions.) Divine piety decay has been simplified to one of two speeds, from seven or so. Some gods have had their piety gain speed buffed to compensate. (For other gods, the change was itself a buff!) Hepliaklqanal now gives innate frail 1 on worship; this persists even after abandonment, until the god is mollified. Pakellas has been temporarily disabled, until we figure out what is going on. Hopefully he’ll be back in time for the next stable release.

Daevas can now smite unsuspecting targets.

Zombies can no longer shapeshift.

Happy crawling!