Hi, crawlers. If you want to know about the latest changes in trunk, you’re in the right place! If not, well, uh… leave a comment and I’ll see what I can do.

New temple god: the Wu Jian Council . An order of militant monks that have ascended to divinity, the Wu Jian Council offer worshippers powerful new combat moves. 1*: Martial Attack – Whirlwind. When moving between two tiles adjacent to the same enemy or enemies, automatically attack them, potentially Slowing those hit. 2*: Martial Attack – Wall Jump. When moving directly into a solid obstacle, instead move two tiles backward, attacking all enemies adjacent to your destination and potentially distracting them. 3*: Martial Attack – Lunge. When moving directly toward a foe, automatically attack them, dealing extra damage to slowed and/or distracted enemies. 4*: Serpent’s Lash. When activated, gain two instant movement actions. 5*: Heaven On Earth. When activated, you are surrounded by opaque clouds, and your combat abilities are enhanced for so long as you continue performing Martial Attacks. All martial attacks scale with movement and attack speed such that fast-movement races aren’t penalized for attacking normally, and slow races aren’t penalized for using martial attacks. Piety is gained through defeating foes. A more verbose writeup (with an old name for the god) is here.

. Noise from the last turn is displayed as a meter in the top-right of the screen, replacing the gold display. (Gold is still visible in % and $, or replacing the piety display for Gozagites.) Noise is an important part of crawl, and even though this display doesn’t communicate the full complexity of it, it’s a big step forward that I’m very excited about – please thank ‘advil’ for implementing it! Here’s a fuller writeup.

from the last turn is displayed as a meter in the top-right of the screen, replacing the gold display. (Gold is still visible in % and $, or replacing the piety display for Gozagites.) Noise is an important part of crawl, and even though this display doesn’t communicate the full complexity of it, it’s a big step forward that I’m very excited about – please thank ‘advil’ for implementing it! Here’s a fuller writeup. Barachians have been rethemed and reworked; instead of being barbarians from the frigid south, they’re creations of the gods who rebelled against their masters long ago. In memory of their maker, shadows still flee at Barachians’ approach, giving them +1 LOS. (Increasing both the range of their attacks, and the range & number of enemies that can attack them!) In compensation for this, their attributes have been raised to human levels, their skills aptitudes have increased by +1 across the board (except for a few flavour-based exceptions), and their Hop’s range now increases even further at XL 13.

have been rethemed and reworked; instead of being barbarians from the frigid south, they’re creations of the gods who rebelled against their masters long ago. In memory of their maker, shadows still flee at Barachians’ approach, giving them +1 LOS. (Increasing both the range of their attacks, and the range & number of enemies that can attack them!) In compensation for this, their attributes have been raised to human levels, their skills aptitudes have increased by +1 across the board (except for a few flavour-based exceptions), and their Hop’s range now increases even further at XL 13. Potions of mutation , cure mutation, and beneficial mutation have been blended together into one big slurry! They (potions of mutation) now removes 2-6 mutations, adds 1-3 random mutations, and then adds another 1 ‘good’ mutation, which is essentially similar to drinking all three old potions in a row. This is intended to encourage more players to interact with the mutation mechanics in 3-rune games, and to create more interesting decisions: a fuller explanation is here.

, cure mutation, and beneficial mutation have been blended together into one big slurry! They (potions of mutation) now removes 2-6 mutations, adds 1-3 random mutations, and then adds another 1 ‘good’ mutation, which is essentially similar to drinking all three old potions in a row. This is intended to encourage more players to interact with the mutation mechanics in 3-rune games, and to create more interesting decisions: a fuller explanation is here. New unrand: Maxwell’s thermic engine , replacing the Dagger of Freezing Death and the Scimitar of Flaming Death. The Thermal Engine is a freezing/flaming double sword that temporarily increases in enchantment with each blow. Trivia: in development, it once had the ability to summon demons. :)

, replacing the Dagger of Freezing Death and the Scimitar of Flaming Death. The Thermal Engine is a freezing/flaming double sword that temporarily increases in enchantment with each blow. Trivia: in development, it once had the ability to summon demons. :) The Ratskin Cloak is somewhat rattier, insofar it can now be evoked to summon rats. Yum!

Warper/Arcane Marksperson shakeup: Gell’s Gravitas loses Hexes (it’s now purely Translocations) and moves into the Wr starting book, while Portal Projectile goes from pure Translocations to Hex/Tloc and moves into the AM starting book. This should, hopefully make both spells and both backgrounds more useful.

Portal Projectile is now manually cancellable.

Transmutations no longer have special-case added damage from str/dex; their base damage has been raised to compensate.

During character selection, species are now ordered by ‘complexity’, e.g. appropriateness for new players. This is intended to guide said new players toward species that will be more fun for them, and away from HuFi. The categories are, of course, fuzzy and somewhat arbitrary; there will probably be more tinkering with them over time.

The auto_butcher option defaults to ‘Very Hungry’, meaning that auto-travel will go to & butcher corpses once the player is ‘Very Hungry’ or hungrier. This is a compromise between the most convenient behavior for most characters and for necromancers/Fedhasites; the latter would rather not automatically butcher every corpse they encounter!

Slow Regeneration is now a 1-level mut, with the effect of the old level 2 of the mut (no natural regeneration while monsters are in LOS). The old Slow Regeneration 3 (no natural regeneration) is now DD-exclusive, and cannot be gained during play.

Deep trolls and iron trolls drop exciting new colours of hides.

Casting Ignition with tentacles on-screen is considerably less dramatic.

Xom is significantly less prone to electrocuting the player.

It should no longer be possible, even in rare circumstances, to be 101% of the way to the next level.

Happy crawling!

Edit: removed marriage, and other errors.