Caster of Magic Release thread : latest version 6.06!

[Seravy]

It's not the same and invisibility is a spell I don't have at least 70% of my games so it can't be done with spearmen.

I meant, you send in a visible spearmen, the AI spends a lot of mana to cast something then kills it, you send in another. For the price of a Nighblade, you can get 15 spearmen so they are better for draining enemy mana.
(Which once more raises my concerns that the AI should probably learn to not cast spells if they have an advantage of that level in combat, but I'm hesitating on doing that, if it holds back on casting in the wrong situation, that's worse than wasting the mana.)

There are more often than not better units if you need that.

Dark Elves actually don't have any strong melee units (even High Elves do!), which is why I made this one fill that role. Also, Nightblades have poison, which is pretty meaningless against fragile ranged units (shaman and magicians) who have high resistance but low health.
Oh, and one more thing. While Invisibility does everything you mention, it is also a buff for melee combat. It grants -1 to hit to all enemies, reducing their damage output by a sizeable amount! So a combination of Invisibility and Poison does imply a melee unit for me.

About using them as defenders, well, I don't know. I think Nighmares (flying ranged attack) or Warlocks (Doom Bolt on first turn) perform better for that.

Overall, I believe a Nightblade unit with less health, a somewhat lower cost, and lower/different building requirements (Fighter's Guild+University or something equal sounds fair), would be an interesting unit which would fill what you are using them for perfectly. However, that leaves the race without a strong melee unit, and without an armorer's guild unit. I'm not sure if I want to go that way, but I'll consider it.

Nightblades are still less effective in direct melee than most other Armorer's Guild units, even with 3 health per figure. They certainly benefit from buffs more due to the number of figures, but Hammerhands, Berserkers, Paladins, Elven Lords, even Pegasai, Slingers and Pikemen are better for that as those either have higher starting stats, or abilities that work better with buffs, while neither poison, nor invisibility scales up with buffing. Thrown, Lucky, Armor Piercing, a secondary missile attack, first strike, those all make attack buffs more valuable. If I wanted to go with the buffing strategy, I would not do it with Dark Elves, unless the enemy is ranged and has low armor...in which case there isn't much of a need for buffing usually.

One more thing to consider. The Dark Elf race has the lowest population growth in the game and in exchange for that, they get the most versatile/special military unit selection in the game (and second best resistance score). It would be odd for them to have no melee unit stronger than halberdiers.

I really need to play a game starting with Dark Elves though. Last time I did that, I had the game on Impossible and lost without being able to see what the race can actually do. I'm actually worried they might not be enough to compensate for the horrible growth.

[Seravy]

I asked a friend and he also says they are too powerful. I will play a game with Dark Elves as soon as I can to see. Was planning High Men but I guess that can wait.
One more thing, I made a random game generator for CoM which will be included in the next update. I want to use that for difficulty level testing.

[Drax]

With Dark Elves it is mandatory to conquer some cities otherwise you can't match others expanding, therefore you should have other high tier units available for melee. This is very likely. If you don't then you're losing and nightblades will not help you anyway.

[ChongLi]

Re: Nightblades. I'd take any judgment of them as "too powerful" with a grain of salt. Because they take so long to get and cost so much to build, it's very likely that anybody who could field a significant number of them is already in a winning position. It's hard to envision a scenario where your first few Nightblades out the door are going to turn the tide in a losing situation where you've already got Warlocks and Nightmares out there.

[lechium]

Great mod. Perhaps you could make all file names uppercase for GNU/Linux compatibility?

[Seravy]

Great mod. Perhaps you could make all file names uppercase for GNU/Linux compatibility?

Sure, why not. Next release will be like that, unless some editors change it back without me noticing meanwhile.

[Azvael]

It is because the AI now considers more possible attack options, and pathfinding is new too, so more actual processing is needed.
Setting your dosbox.conf to Core=dynamic and cycles=100000 (hundred thousand) should help, it worked for me and at least 2 more people so far. Higher values might even work if your computer can handle it, mine didn't like 200k.
The default core option can usually handle fewer cycles before causing problems.
Experiment, and find a setting that works for you, the key is to get the cycles as high as you can.

Yep, that did it. Thank you. Apparently, my dosbox-fu is weak.

------

My thoughts on dark elves are below. Warning: wall of text follows.

CoM Dark elves have been made playable (compared to MoM dark elves) by growth improvements, unit costs reductions, and buffs. However, the slow growth rate is still a major handicap, resulting in less than competitive expansion and development when compared to other races. This slow development translates into slow military development; it takes far too long to deploy dark elf top-tier units when compared to other races.

The buffed ranged attack is actually a strong advantage. It increases the lifespan of swordsmen, and dark elf cavalry rock in the earlygame. However, I consider the ranged attack to be a short-term benefit as it becomes obsolete by the late middlegame, and is effectively neutralized by nature wizards. Priests do the same job, only better.

I've grudgingly come to the conclusion there's no real reason to play them. Dwarves have better production and gold, trolls are a better conquest races, draconians have the best tactical advantage of any race (flight) and beastmen are versatile and powerful. The races that don't generate mana can produce superior mid to late-tier units well before dark elves, and the races that do produce mana can produce competitive units and generate mana at the same rate as dark elves, yet don't suffer their handicaps. I don't think it's inaccurate to think of dark elves as beastmen with a ranged attack and a retarded development rate.

I have two suggestions:

(1) Give dark elves the same growth rate as high elves; slow but not crippling.

Or...

(2) Keep the growth rate as is. Return the +1 mana per population to the dark elves and get rid of the cathedral.

Or...

(3) Do both. If you did both, I'd suggest changing the dark elves' unrest-by-race values to something close to the original in order to compensate. This means being forced to make some hard decisions about which cities to capture, while being forced to rely more heavilly on non-military expansion.

I think option (1) would be enough to make them sufficiently competitive growth-wise without being overwhelmingly strong.

Options (2) and/or (3) would return dark elves to the position of being the top power generators on Myrror, in the same way the high elves are on Arcanus. This was the reason one played dark elves, originally: the power per population. It makes dark elves an ideal choice for conjurer and academic victory strategies, and allows it to distinguish itself from the other, Myrran races.

Just my two cents.

Once again, thanks for creating this mod.

[Seravy]

I have two suggestions:

(1) Give dark elves the same growth rate as high elves; slow but not crippling.

Or...

(2) Keep the growth rate as is. Return the +1 mana per population to the dark elves and get rid of the cathedral.

Or...

(3) Do both. If you did both, I'd suggest changing the dark elves' unrest-by-race values to something close to the original in order to compensate. This means being forced to make some hard decisions about which cities to capture, while being forced to rely more heavilly on non-military expansion.

I think option (1) would be enough to make them sufficiently competitive growth-wise without being overwhelmingly strong.

Options (2) and/or (3) would return dark elves to the position of being the top power generators on Myrror, in the same way the high elves are on Arcanus. This was the reason one played dark elves, originally: the power per population. It makes dark elves an ideal choice for conjurer and academic victory strategies, and allows it to distinguish itself from the other, Myrran races.

Just my two cents.

Once again, thanks for creating this mod.

I'm tempted to go with (2), but without removing the Cathedral (that would still leave them almost as bad at power as other races, a pop 25 city, which isn't exactly frequent unless playing Nature, is only +13 power compared to the current amount, and taking away the Cathedral would result in a mere +8. On less ideal terrain the gain would be close to nothing, and due to pop growth, it would actually come later than for other races who can just build the cathedral earlier.)
Even then, a massive empire of 20 cities having 18 pop each would only contribute 360 power, which is certainly great but...not that outstanding when you consider a Dwarf city sometimes gets 50-100 power from a single city due to crystals. Or if you consider a city generates 22 power when fully built from buildings.
On the other hand, Warlocks (and nightmares and nightblades) are an entire league better than units other races have, because they can clear out high end nodes, even without buffs and often without losses, and that boosts the power base a lot. Other Myrran races also produce strong units, but not even Doom Drakes are as good at killing "many Behemoths" and the like as Warlocks.

I removed their extra power ability back when they were still growing like most other buffed races and didn't get used to the extra power from buildings, then reduced the growth because their units were too good, doing both was overkill. Their units ARE worth it even then, problem is, you have no reason to build additional Dark Elf cities aside form the military center(s), and you don't even need to start with Dark Elves, conquering one is enough.

[Azvael]

I'm tempted to go with (2), but without removing the Cathedral (that would still leave them almost as bad at power as other races, a pop 25 city, which isn't exactly frequent unless playing Nature, is only +13 power compared to the current amount, and taking away the Cathedral would result in a mere +8. On less ideal terrain the gain would be close to nothing, and due to pop growth, it would actually come later than for other races who can just build the cathedral earlier.)
Even then, a massive empire of 20 cities having 18 pop each would only contribute 360 power, which is certainly great but...not that outstanding when you consider a Dwarf city sometimes gets 50-100 power from a single city due to crystals. Or if you consider a city generates 22 power when fully built from buildings.
On the other hand, Warlocks (and nightmares and nightblades) are an entire league better than units other races have, because they can clear out high end nodes, even without buffs and often without losses, and that boosts the power base a lot. Other Myrran races also produce strong units, but not even Doom Drakes are as good at killing "many Behemoths" and the like as Warlocks.

Excellent points. Then, I'd like to suggest the mana buff plus cathedral, as you described, please.

You're right about dark elf units. It's part of the reason I tend to keep coming back them them despite my frustrations with their growth. They've got the best magic users and cavalry, and nightblades are terrifying (I've never tried nightmares for some reason). I think the changes you've made to their units really make them shine without being dangerously overpowered. The trick is getting a city to the point it can produce them.

I removed their extra power ability back when they were still growing like most other buffed races and didn't get used to the extra power from buildings, then reduced the growth because their units were too good, doing both was overkill. Their units ARE worth it even then, problem is, you have no reason to build additional Dark Elf cities aside form the military center(s), and you don't even need to start with Dark Elves, conquering one is enough.

True, but it's the difference of having a few dark elf cities (conquered) cranking out warlocks versus a lot of dark elf cities (native) cranking out warlocks. Plus, with 1 mana per population, this adds a whole new dimension to dark elves, making them very tempting for players who rely heavily on fantastic units.

[Seravy]

1.43 is available for download!

1.43
-Fixed bug : Overland spellbook shows incorrect amount of turns in some cases
-Slightly increased cost of Barracks, War College to go match the more valuable veteran level, and higher exp requirements.
-Fixed bug : The spell charges menu does not work.
-Random game generator : Generate.exe included. It generates a random set of starting parameters for your land, race, and wizard options. Spells not included, selecting the right spells for the right game is far too important to randomize.
-Reapplied : AI will now target the best city with curses instead of always only the fortress. (no idea why but this change seems to have vanished)
-Reduced AI's preference of troll shaman and improved preference of War Trolls and Mammoths. Troll Shaman are still somewhat more preferred than other types of shaman, but not to the point of rivalling high end units anymore.
-Fixed : game interface unresposive when all units immobilized
-Fixed : player's turn ends when all units immobilized before being able to cast a spell
-Fixed : info and flee buttons end player turn before spellcasting if all units immobilized
-AI will no longer break alliances if their two allies are at war with each other (didn't work half the time)
-Break Alliance and Declare War proposals now consider relative army stength of the two AIs and personality has a reversed effect (more peaceful will accept less often)
-Dark Elf cities now generate 1 power per population again.
-Fixed bug : AI cannot cast Prayer unless the player has High Prayer in effect (intended code was “AI cannot cast Prayer if they have High Prayer in effect”)
-Fixed : The effects of Supreme Light stop affecting units with magical ranged attacks if they run out of ammo.
-When the next combat unit is autoselected, it'll be the unit with the lowest ID available instead of the one being physically closest to the one already selected, which is completely meaningless. This should at least ensure that melee units get prompted for commands first, and ranged afterwards (followed by any combat summons as last)

I haven't had the chance to test how good Nighblades are for combat because I ended up playing a peaceful game, everyone allies, no combat until Spell of Mastery :D
On top of that I was playing Life and had a whole bunch of buffs in play so everything was more powerful than they normally are, not the ideal conditions for testing. I have to play another Dark Elf game later.