Alpha:BLUDTUPOWA

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BLUDTUPOWA
BludtupowaLarge.png
Mana Cost 0
Effect Increased Mana Regeneration; No Health Regeneration.
Unlocked By Completing Normal with Bloodmage
Notes Toggled On/Off freely


BLUDTUPOWA ("Blood to Power") is one of the Glyphs you can find in a game of Desktop Dungeons. A unique type of Glyph, it can be turned on and off freely without spending Mana. When activated, it doubles Mana Regeneration but disables Health Regeneration. Initially locked and available only to the Bloodmage, it can become unlocked and available for all classes.

Usage

BLUDTUPOWA is unique amongst the Glyphs, because it is a "toggled" ability: Click it once to turn it "on", and again to turn it "off".

Activating or deactivating BLUDTUPOWA costs no Mana whatsoever, and may be done at any time.

Effect

While BLUDTUPOWA is in its "activated" state, tile exploration will regenerate 2 Mana Points per tile instead of the normal 1 Mana Point per tile.

On the other hand, while it is activated, BLUDTUPOWA will prevent all Health Regeneration from exploring tiles.

The end result is that activating BLUDTUPOWA enables a speedier regeneration of Mana instead of regenerating any Health. The key is then to know learn when to turn BLUDTUPOWA on for increased Mana regeneration, and when to turn it off to regain lost Health. Different classes will behave differently in this regard.

Availability

For a new Player Profile, BLUDTUPOWA is not available for use. To be able to use BLUDTUPOWA at all, the player must unlock the Bloodmage class by defeating the Normal Dungeon with a Sorcerer.

Any game played with the Bloodmage will start with the BLUDTUPOWA Glyph on the starting tile. The Bloodmage needs to pick it up if he intends to use it. BLUDTUPOWA always appears when playing the Bloodmage class, regardless of any other factors.

Once the Normal Dungeon is beaten with an Bloodmage, BLUDTUPOWA becomes fully unlocked. From that point onwards, the BLUDTUPOWA Glyph has a chance to appear in any dungeon played, regardless of any other factors. The chance for it to appear is supposedly the same as that of other Glyphs, though this has not yet been conclusively proven.

In addition, once the dungeon shops have been upgraded enough by completing the Normal and Snake Pit dungeons with several classes, shops may occasionally sell BLUDTUPOWA. This requires a shop quality level of 35. If the Glyph is bought in this way, it will be placed on the tile the shop used to occupy (the shop disappears, as always).

Spell Combos

Naturally, increased Mana intake from exploration means that any Glyph may be cast more often once BLUDTUPOWA is acquired. Some Glyphs benefit more than others from this increased regeneration.

BURNDAYRAZ

BURNDAYRAZ is the most common and straightforward Glyph to combine with BLUDTUPOWA: If you can defeat a monster with BURNDAYRAZ alone (I.E. without having to resort to Melee attacks), only your Mana will have been depleted, and you can use BLUDTUPOWA to gain it back twice as fast as normal for the next creature fight.

Naturally, heavy spellcasters will find this combo useful in most situations they encounter. This is less true when the character relies on Melee attacks, in which case one of the Three-Glyph-Combos below may be required.

APHEELSIK

APHEELSIK and BLUDTUPOWA on their own are not very useful, but will become a powerful combo with a third Glyph, BURNDAYRAZ.

With this combo, BURNDAYRAZ is cast on a monster as many times as possible, followed by APHEELSIK to freeze its Health regeneration. BLUDTUPOWA is then used to regain Mana quickly using up fewer unexplored tiles, and the process is repeated.

To maximize efficiency, your hero will need a respectable Maximum Mana - enough to cast BURNDAYRAZ at least twice before running out of Mana. This will cut down on the number of times you need to "waste" Mana on APHEELSIK to facilitate further exploration. The more Fireballs you can cast before reaching 5 Mana, the more efficient this becomes.

With this tactic, it is quite possible for heavy spellcasters to destroy monsters several levels above them - theoretically killing a boss without the use of potions or other healing devices!

Always remember to leave 5 Mana for APHEELSIK at the end of your BURNDAYRAZ volley.

CYDSTEPP

A preferred combo for Melee Combat specialists is BLUDTUPOWA and CYDSTEPP. The high cost of CYDSTEPP (10 Mana, normally) can be replenished quickly when BLUDTUPOWA is activated. This is augmented by the way CYDSTEPP works: Your health becomes less relevant because CYDSTEPP will prevent death even if your Current Health is only 1 point. Therefore, repeated use of CYDSTEPP means that you do not actually need to regenerate Health at all.

Of course, this depends on how many times you can cast CYDSTEPP without having to regenerate Mana for more CYDSTEPPs. If you require a large number of hits to take a monster down, keeping your health full for the first attack may be required (to get a hit on the monster without having to avoid death, and so forth).

Once again, when combined with APHEELSIK this can be a winning strategy (see APHEELSIK, above), especially for characters with a powerful attack and low Maximum Health. It is not recommended for heroes who rely on a weak attack and plenty of Health, as they will usually need to regenerate their Health more often, and benefit less from each blow they make.

GETINDARE

Another Three-Glyph-Combo together with BLUDTUPOWA and BURNDAYRAZ, this Glyph can help heroes who require one Melee attack to bring their foe to 0 Health after weakening it with BURNDAYRAZ. Due to the nature of First Strike (bestowed by GETINDARE), if the fireballs together with the finishing Melee Attack can bring the monster to 0 Health, the hero will have lost no Health at all, and can then use BLUDTUPOWA to focus on Mana Regeneration for the next combat.

HALPMEH

This Glyph has a special relationship with BLUDTUPOWA, as together they enable the player to control both Mana and Health regeneration as they see fit.

BLUDTUPOWA will gain you a large number of Mana points per tile explored, but no Health points. You can then cast HALPMEH as many times as required in your specific situation to regain as much Health as you require. In this way, you can artificially regenerate the required amount of Health whenever you need it, without having to waste unexplored tiles. Without BLUDTUPOWA, or when the Glyph is deactivated, exploring for Health is wasteful when your Mana pool is already full. With this combo, that never happens because you can always use that extra Mana for more healing, and explore only to regain lost Mana.

This is assisted by the fact that the conversion rates for HALPMEH and BLUDTUPOWA are completely in sync with normal Health and Mana regeneration: Correctly using these you can artifically emulate normal Health and Mana regeneration rates, so neither Mana or Health is lost when choosing to use this combo instead of turning BLUDTUPOWA off.

Finally, note that the Wizard (who has lower Mana costs for spells) can actually achieve better-than-normal Health Regeneration with this combo, since the Mana Conversion ratio of HALPMEH is 33% better for this character class. However, the Wizard has little use for Health unless attempting to play as a Melee-oriented character. Use with caution!

LEMMISI

For spellcasting specialists, LEMMISI and BLUDTUPOWA can be a terrific combo used once all tiles have been explored - I.E. when preparing for the final boss fight. You will regain 2 points of Mana for each tile revealed by LEMMISI instead of the normal 1. So instead of simply regaining the amount of Mana required to cast the spell, you will gain 3 extra points of Mana for every use, enabling you to regenerate your Mana with LEMMISI. Of course, this kills off LEMMISI's Health Regeneration, but you can always turn BLUDTUPOWA off when it is required.

Note that for Wizards this is even more useful: They will regain 4 Mana points for each use of this combo, instead of only 3.

Specific Classes

Bloodmage

Choosing a Bloodmage for a dungeon will always spawn the BLUDTUPOWA Glyph on the starting tile (see above). Bloodmages use BLUDTUPOWA to regenerate their Mana, and can always use remaining Blood-stains to regenerate their Health when required. However, as noted on the Bloodmage character class page, this Glyph is actually less useful for Bloodmages than it is for some other classes who rely more on their spellcasting abilities.

Paladin / Warlord

The Paladin begins each dungeon with the HALPMEH Glyph, while the Warlord begins each dungeon with the CYDSTEPP Glyph. As discussed above, both these Glyphs can form powerful combos with BLUDTUPOWA.

Transmuter

This character class derives the single greatest benefit from BLUDTUPOWA, because Transmuters already do not regenerate Health from exploration. Therefore, once BLUDTUPOWA has been acquired, the Transmuter can simply leave it on all the time, gaining its doubled Mana regeneration without the concession of Health Regeneration.

The downside of course is that this leaves only one Glyph slot unoccupied, as the Transmuter now has both ENDISWAL (his crucial Glyph) and BLUDTUPOWA taking up the other two slots. This cuts down on the number of combos you can use, but is usually worth it.

Also note: If you intend to join Binlor Ironshield (practically a necessity for this character class), remember to turn BLUDTUPOWA on before doing so. Binlor will deduct -1 Piety point for the activation of the Glyph. This is really not much compared to the amount of Piety you'll be collecting though, so it's not that big a deal.

BLUDTUPOWA and the Gods

Several Gods in the game have various opinions about the use of BLUDTUPOWA - they may favour it or reject it, depending on their own particular creeds.

Glowing Guardian

Glowing Guarding is perhaps the most staunch opponent of BLUDTUPOWA.

If BLUDTUPOWA is already in the hero's Glyph Slots when joining Glowing Guardian, it will be deactivated immediately (assuming it was activated beforehand). From that point onward, any attempt to reactivate BLUDTUPOWA will fail spectacularly, costing you -20 Piety points! The only thing to do with BLUDTUPOWA remains to convert it, unless you plan to renounce Glowing Guardian at some stage.

Binlor Ironshield

Binlor Ironshield isn't very fond of Magic. The only spell he allows you to cast without negative consequence is ENDISWAL. All other spells will incur a penalty of -1 Piety points.

This effect applies also to any activation or deactivation of BLUDTUPOWA. This makes the Glyph relatively useless when worshipping Binlor: Most characters will need to turn the Glyph on and off repeatedly, and those who don't will still be relying on massive spellcasting anyway, so Piety will invariably be lost at a high rate.

The only exception is the Transmuter. This character can earn massive amounts of Piety from destroying walls, and has no real drawback from keeping BLUDTUPOWA on constantly. Do remember to activate it before joining Binlor if you want to avoid losing that one Piety point.

Taurog

Taurog despises any use of magic, and will deduct -5 Piety Points for each use of a Glyph. This includes both the activation and deactivation of BLUDTUPOWA. In other words, not a good idea.

Mystera Annur

Mstera Annur awards +1 Piety point (or +2 with a Boon) for each use of a Glyph. Unfortunately, unlike Taurog and Binlor, this does not extend to the BLUDTUPOWA Glyph.

Therefore, while BLUDTUPOWA does invariably increase the number of spells you can cast per dungeon (hence increasing Piety gain indirectly), it is not in itself a way to gain Piety with Mystera Annur.


Desktop Dungeons Alpha
General Concepts: New Players Guide · Strategy · Advanced Strategy · Races · Glyphs · Mana · Leveling · Items · Scoring
Classes: Tier 1: Fighter · Thief · Priest · Wizard Tier 2: Berserker · Rogue · Monk · Sorcerer Tier 3: Warlord · Assassin · Paladin · Bloodmage Special: Transmuter · Crusader · Tinker · Gorgon · Half-dragon · Vampire · Changeling
Gods: Binlor Ironshield · Dracul · The Earthmother · Glowing Guardian · Jehora Jeheyu · Mystera Annur · The Pactmaker · Taurog · Tikki Tooki
Monsters: Animated Armour · Bandit · Dragonspawn · Goat · Goblin · Golem · Goo blob · Gorgon · Imp · Meat man · Naga · Serpent · Vampire · Warlock · Wraith · Zombie
Dungeons: Normal · Snake Pit · Library · Crypt · Factory · Ranked · Gauntlet · Lothlorien (Campaign) · The Boss Hive
Glyphs: APHEELSIK · BLUDTUPOWA · BURNDAYRAZ · BYSSEPS · CYDSTEPP · ENDISWAL · GETINDARE · HALPMEH · IMAWAL · LEMMISI · PISORF · WEYTWUT · WONAFYT