SORCERY Realm

[Seravy]

Ok, some brainstorming on Counter Magic.

A1. Counters all spells.
Reliable, but unfun.

A2. Counters only "harm" spells.
Reliable, Fun (on the user's side), and somewhat less painful on the receiving end. Still, Chaos and Death are hurt far too much (90% of their combat spells are "harm" spells, they barely have buffing or the like - in case of Death even their combat globals are harmful). Also Sorcery has a whole bunch of stuff you can't beat without using "harm" type spells (Djinn! Flying Fortress!) - getting past Magic Immunity is hard enough but then getting countered anyway on top of it...

A3. Counters based on spell cost
Unreliable - if the enemy picks a more expensive spell, it doesn't work. And expensive spells are used more often than cheaper spells, once they are available.

A4. Counters based on rarity
Unreliable - same as cost.

B1. Counters at random chance
Bad, makes the spell unreliable and not suitable for Sorcery realm.

B2. Counters are guaranteed on matching spells
Too powerful, not fun to play against

All I see are bad choices here.

...one thing is certain though. It shouldn't have a slider. It's not worth casting below max anyway.

[Seravy]

Until I have a better idea, I've set up Counter Magic to cost 50 but have a "counter pool" of 80.

What about Uranus' Blessing? Do we make that have a max power counter magic or keep the reduced? 50 instead of 80 is absolutely horrible in comparison and prevents you from casting a stronger one.

[Seravy]

Assuming it doesn't have 8 books, the AI picks these spells as guaranteed uncommons from Sorcery :

Lawful/Peaceful :
1. AEther Binding
2. If Sorcery+Nature+Life then Spell Lock
3. Dispelling Wave

Maniacal/Aggressive/Chaotic/Ruthless
1. Spell Blast
2. If Sorcery+Nature+Life then Spell Lock
3. Dispelling Wave

The AI can't use Spell Blast randomly until mid/late game now so picking it for "curse" personalities seems questionable. Counter Magic or AEther Binding might be better?
(I don't think it needs Water Elemental, as they will likely have an uncommon summon from their other realm(s))
On the other hand it does ensure protection from Spell of Mastery which is important, and it also means it can stop nasty spells from other AI if the human isn't an enemy and doesn't remove the Detect Magic.

Still, as Spell Blast is now mostly ineffective against the human (and even helpful as a Sorcery ally will blast the others) I think I will replace it ...by Aura of Majesty, as it might help these personalities stay at peace and/or gain some allies.

[Arnuz]

If you're playing against a life buffer, holy weapon on those longbowmen/elven lords/paladins/etc can be quite harmful...

[Nelphine]

I think maniacal wizards might still have issues with spell blast. I'm playing against Horus (Life/Sorcery, no Stasis that I've ever seen, no Detect Magic), and he casts spell blast every round. I don't really mind that at all - he's above 250 casting skill, on lunatic, so yeah, he's going to cast curses every round, which means spell blast for this particular wizard. My concern is what if he's doing multiple spell blasts per round? Is it possible he's trying to blast me more than once? Does the AI know enough to not target the same enemy with spell blast more than once per round? If it does, will it target allies if it already targetted enemies? Regardless of the answer to that, is there a hard limit of 4 spell blasts per round?

[Seravy]

I think maniacal wizards might still have issues with spell blast.  I'm playing against Horus (Life/Sorcery, no Stasis that I've ever seen, no Detect Magic), and he casts spell blast every round.  I don't really mind that at all - he's above 250 casting skill, on lunatic, so yeah, he's going to cast curses every round, which means spell blast for this particular wizard.  My concern is what if he's doing multiple spell blasts per round? Is it possible he's trying to blast me more than once? Does the AI know enough to not target the same enemy with spell blast more than once per round?  If it does, will it target allies if it already targetted enemies? Regardless of the answer to that, is there a hard limit of 4 spell blasts per round?

Random spell blasts can be more than once a turn, on-demand cannot.
The cost is so low I don't care.
No it can't target allies or other non-hostile targets.

[Nelphine]

So he could be wasting skill/mana, but you're not going to worry about it due to the low cost. Ok, i can accept that. Thanks!

Also, I feel like detect magic priority might be too low. I'm against 3 sorcery wizards (as described elsewhere), and none of them cast Detect Magic, although it's 1413, and they're deep into rare research by now.

(My barbarian inquisitor approach is putting me WAY behind in research compared to usual. That's the only major affect I've noticed.)

[Seravy]

Detect Magic is being researched roughly one third into rares (it and Spell Blast got pushed even further back to reduce unwanted influence on the early game). Depending on where exactly they are it's possible it was just recently researched or not at all - they at least research their rare creature first, in case of some realms also a few others.
The other possibility : They haven't gotten Spell Blast - they aren't 8+ Sorcery books to have every uncommon.

[Nelphine]

2 have spell blast, both maniacal have used it on me randomly. The peaceful wants to get it from me in trade, so doesn't have it. I suppose they could be behind on research. But myrran wizard, 13-18 myrran cities, life force and aether binding in play for more than 6 years? Heck I might have traded detect magic to them (I trade most arcane things if I get the chance.) Seems unlikely. But until I see very rares, I won't worry.

[Nelphine]

OK, how does one play mono sorcery, without warlord?? (Master, I keep getting crushed before I have defenses for anything, and I have no idea how to take any nodes)

Also, I generally have to declare war by turn 40 on at least 1 AI, just to make sure I get more than 4 cities.