# Talk:Draw energy
Does this technique actually work? It incapacitates you for 15 turns, during which you will naturally gain energy. But do you gain more energy than just waiting for 15 turns, and do the listed environments actually change the increase? I've never noticed a difference between using this technique on plain ground (should be +1), an altar (should be full regeneration within 8 turns), or a grave (power loss). The draw energy function (tech.c in SLASH'EM 0.0.7E7F2, line 1764) is definitely getting called but I think the switch statement never does anything. Can anyone confirm this, e.g. with gdb? -- Qazmlpok 18:25, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

Just tried it next to four graves at level 30 - it definitely drained my power, by 29 points.  But if I had been losing power for 15 turns, I should have lost 240 points, counterbalanced by all of 4d3 from normal energy regeneration.  So it does seem to be doing something, but it's nowhere near as powerful as it should be.  It seems like it might have only worked for two turns - four graves, four points lost from each, two turns, and three points regenerated makes for 29 lost.  Trying it with the ground again seemed like too little for 15 turns.  And trying with an altar seemed to lower my regeneration - I only got back around three power points.  So something about it is weird, but it is indeed working to some degree. -Ion frigate 19:03, 26 June 2011 (UTC)
Aha, so that's the problem. When they say "surroundings" they mean surroundings. I always tried it on top of the square in question, e.g. standing atop an altar. I never noticed the +u.dx, +u.dy in the code before. I imagine that every square except the one you're standing on is checked, which also explains why the power boosts for altar and throne are so high. And so when I tested this by standing on a grave it also didn't do a thing. I used a dunce cap this time to make the natural power regeneration neglible, and standing next to nothing gave +15 energy over just waiting 15 turns, so it's definitely working properly. Standing next to a single throne with 280 power gave me 60, which means it hit the throne once for +46 power and nothing 14 other turns. I'll update the article now that I know how this tech is working. -- Qazmlpok 20:50, 26 June 2011 (UTC)