Wellspring talisman

Version 0.34: This article is up to date for the latest stable release of Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup.

A small amphora from which pours a seemingly unending quantity of water. Transforms the user's flesh into elemental water, allowing them to move flexibly and reach to attack from a great distance. From time to time, they can even cause the water around them to rise up and drown their enemies. The malleability of this water even allows them to retain the benefits of their physical mutations, but cold attacks can freeze it solid and fire may cause it to erupt with steam.

A wellspring talisman is a talisman that turns your body into a wellspring of elemental water.

Useful Info

When Put on, a wellspring talisman transforms you into Aqua Form, which lasts until you end the form. Entering a form takes 4 turns and exiting it takes 5.

Aqua Form has the following effects:

Offensive traits

• Unarmed combat: 3 base damage (no bonus)
• All attacks gain +2 tiles of reaching.
  • Auxiliary attacks can be used with reaching attacks.
  • Stacks with the reaching of polearms (including Rift). Attacks made possible by the reaching of a polearm (further than 3 tiles away) will not trigger aux attacks.
  • Cleaving will hit the primary target and all enemies adjacent to you.
  • Cannot get stabs with reaching hits.
• Watery Grave: Active ability with XP-based cooldown. Deals drowning damage to all enemies in water within 4 tiles of the player and applies the waterlogged status effect, if possible, then removes shallow water created by the player. Damage scales with Shapeshifting skill:
  • Below minimum: 4d1 damage (0 skill) - 4d15 damage (12 skill)
  • Above minimum: 4d15 damage (12 skill) - 4d25 damage (20 skill)

Defensive traits

• Amorphous: Cannot be constricted or held.
• Amphibious: Can travel through water and ignore water penalties, immune to drowning damage
• Innate EV: Linearly scales from the following points, rounding down:
  • Below minimum: +0 EV (0 skill) - +6 (12 skill)
  • Above minimum: +6 EV (12 skill) - +13 EV (20 skill)
• When damaged, you sometimes create temporary pools of shallow water nearby.
  • Taking fire damage releases steam clouds.
  • Taking cold damage applies the frozen status 50% of the time, slowing movement speed.

Restrictions

• Melded Gear: Body armor
• Suppressed mutations: Substance

Aqua Form has a minimum Shapeshifting skill of 12, below which you get an HP penalty. The maximum skill for this form is 20.

Strategy

This form can at least be helpful in the Lair branches. Constriction immunity is great in Snake and web immunity helps defend against jumping spiders in Spider. Swamp and Shoals are filled with water, allowing you to benefit from amphibiousness and Watery Grave.

The Watery Grave ability is akin to extra charges of a phial of floods - preventing enemy casters from using spells at all is a strong effect, although it only affects creatures in water.

The damage from steam clouds can be fully resisted by any amount of rF+, but rC+ does not protect from the Frozen status.

Humanoid	Armataur	Djinni	Felid	Gargoyle	Naga	Octopode

History

• Wellspring talismans were added in 0.33.