The Goatperson - Exploring character classes in Desktop Dungeons: Rewind #14

“Who is the Goatperson? For the hungry, they are water. For the sick, they are a broken kettle. For the sad, they are a kick to the shin. For the poor, they are late stage capitalism. For the debtor, they are a well aimed blunt instrument to the knee.”

My time has come. Today is the day I write about… the Goatperson. The Goatperson was a sick joke for people who complained that the game was “not roguelike enough,” and a way to thank everyone who supported the game during development (we say thanks in strange ways.)

And now I’m going to “explain” how to play this beautiful abomination of a class. Here’s a GIF showing what it feels like to play Goatperson:

Abilities

🐐 Scapegoat - Randomly worships a new god per level, no conversion or desecration

🐐 Prototype - No restoration effects on level-up, gold instead of trophies

🐐 Herbivore - Eats food while exploring. Killing enemies yields more food

So let’s sum it up: you can die of starvation, have no choice in which God you worship, and don’t heal when you level up. Great.

Scapegoat is by far the strangest trait in the game. Starting a run, you’ll automatically be worshipping a God and their altar will be revealed on the map. You won’t get any piety for the initial worship, and will not gain any of the glyphs they'd usually give you. When you level up, your worship will be forcefully changed to another God. You’ll have 3 gods in total that will be switched between.

Something worth keeping in mind is that Gods can give boons that will make other Gods ruin your run. If Dracul gives you Life Steal through Blood Hunger, you better pray that Glowing Guardian isn’t in your pool. Otherwise, well, uh… BG I guess.

Prototype hampers you immensely, forcing you to reveal tiles or quaff potions to heal up. Bye bye, well timed level ups! To somewhat make up for this, your conversion bonus is a full health and mana restore… Except it costs 100 conversion points which increases by 10 every time you use it. Oh, did I mention that it doesn’t cure mana burn and poison like levelling up does? Yeah, you’ll need potions or a divine intervention to help you with that.

Herbivore is just here to make your life even more difficult. Whenever you reveal a new tile, you’ll heal up as per usual and eat one goat food. However, if you don’t have goat food you’ll take damage and drain mana instead. You start with 90 goat food, and gain 9 every time you kill an experience-valuable monster. This means using Imawal is usually a bad idea because you’re petrifying your food.

“Eating rocks is not recommended.”
- local health care professional.

Prayers for the Goatperson

When playing the goat person, there are only 2 things you can do: play as well as you can, and pray. Here are some prayers I would recommend:

🔪 Taurog, grant me the strength and fortitude to slay my foes, for I am meagre.

✨ Mystera, provide me magic, for Burndayraz was in the corner of the map.

🌲 Earthmother, forgive me for consuming monsters, for I am hungry. Bah.

💸 Tikki, thank you for accepting cash, for I have nothing else to offer.

👀 Jehora, please don’t randomly poison or mana burn me, for I have no potions left.

📜 Glowing Guardian, bestow on me your Prayer Beads to restore my faith, for I have no hope.

🩸 Dracul, I beg that you are by my side when fighting the boss, for I am weak.

🤝 Pactmaker, give me a slight edge in this dungeon, for I am a pillow in a sword fight.

(Thanks to Eable on our Discord for the ideas!)

Glyphs

🐐 Wonafyt - The Goatperson’s food delivery service of choice! Wonafyt teleports an enemy next to the player and slows them. It first teleports monsters that are the same level as the player, and then will teleport lower levels when there are none. Use this to make sure you don’t starve™.

🐐 Pisorf - How do you b(l)eat two bosses at once? You headbutt them into each other! If you can line them up, use this glyph to damage both bosses at once while converting your other items for refills on your health and mana.

🐐 Burndayraz - As you might have guessed by this point, the Goatperson is more parts prey than predator. You’d also be a lot more scared of your prey if they could throw fireballs at you. While you have no bonus to damage like other classes, Burndayraz scales linearly with your level and is almost always useful. It’s worth preparing Flame Magnet to make sure you can get through the first couple levels.

One other very useful glyph is Bludtupowa. Bludtopowa costs health to use, reveals tiles, and restores mana. The great thing is that it reveals 3 tiles but only costs one food. This why you can peak into the fog while saving your snacks for later. As per usual, using what you find is important. Getindare will eventually save you from getting hit and therefore save food, Halpmeh can help with using your tiles efficiently, and Weytwut can get you out of tight spots.

The Goatperson actually has some awesome lore behind them, and existed before any other Kin! If you join our Discord and ask, we have a local lore fanatic who'll gladly tell you about it ːbleatyː

Otherwise, that's all we have for today! Desktop Dungeons: Rewind releases on the 18th of April, so bleat that wishlist button! Here are some chilled goats to make your day.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1976950/Desktop_Dungeons_Rewind/

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