CHAOS
The realm of Chaos generally promotes destruction through direct damage and powerful, but simple, cheap and brutal creatures generally lacking the wider array of abilities found on creatures of other realms but being very good at doing one specific thing : killing enemies. While there are spells that have highly random elements, which the realm's name implies, these aren't the core of the realm, as that would be hardly reliable or fun in a strategy game.
Strengths
- Direct damage
- World destruction
- Boosting damage output
- Good selection of powerful, but simple creatures
Weaknesses
- Lacks means of protecting your units
Spells marked Green are spells I'm 100% satisfied with. They won't be changed unless there is a very good reason to.
Spells marked Red are what I'm not satisfied with, and think requires some sort of a significant change.
Spells marked Blue are good the way they are, but might need numerical tweaking (on costs, or effect strength)
Spells marked neither are spells I don't have enough experience using and fighting against to judge.
Common Spells
1. Hell Hounds
Cost : 40
Maintenance : 1
Research : Normal
Effect : Summoning 4 figures : Melee 4, Fire Breath 3, +1 To Hit, Defense 2, Resistance 5, Moves 3, 4 health.
Used to be one of the best common summons in the game, now after all the rebalancing, this creature feels slightly unimpressive. Roughly as powerful as a unit of Cavalry in health and defense, and having identical cost, but requiring mana and casting skill, I feel it should be buffed up a very slightly. The ability to attack flying units is excellent at this early in the game, though. The main concern is the attack power, although 2x 3 attack is pretty good in theory, almost everything in the game has enough armor aside from Spearmen and ranged units to significantly reduce that damage. An increase to 4 melee might be needed.
2. Corruption
Cost : 40
Research : Half
Effect : Corrupts the target land square.
It destroys enemy minerals which is good, although not exactly what you usually want to cast in the very early game. Reduction of food and production bonuses from terrain has a marginal effect on the enemy because the other tiles and cities will still produces resources, but it can critically hurt a city on bad terrain with only a few tiles of food producing land. Can be useful against enemies that play a race with no Shaman or Priest unit. Becomes obsolete as soon as you get Raise Volcano. Due to the common ability "Purify" removing this spell is not an option, but the effect feels somewhat underwhelming. The catch with this spell is, if you are actively at war with the target, you will eventually get the terrain at which time this spell will backfire, and the effect only helps on long term. If you aren't at war, you don't want to cast this because you can't stop them from cleaning it up, and it would also worsen relations, making them start a war at which point, see previous sentence.
Not sure how to make this useful, and the game does need this spell for the AI to cast it against you.
Would need to test whether spamming it against an enemy can cause enough food shortage to actually help winning an early game war. I suspect not, since shore tiles cannot be corrupted but produce food anyway.
9. Flame Blade
Cost : 10/50
Maintenance : 1
Research : Half
Effect : Enchanted normal unit gains +3 melee attack, and +2 missile or thrown attack and can ignore Weapon Immunity.
At a boost of 3, this is now as good as Lionheart's offense part, which is good enough for an uncommon spell.
4. Fire Elemental
Cost : 20
Research : Normal
Effect : Summons a Fire Elemental (now has Weapon Immunity).
A rather weak single figure combat summon, with a unique speciality : Weapon Immunity, which is pretty much a guaranteed win against early game normal units not having magical weapons. Not very Chaos-like, but definitely powerful enough, and occasionally useful in the midgame as well (if enemies without magical weapons attack). I don't see too many options on how else to make it useful though, and early game Weapon Immunity is needed somewhere to provide a use for magical weapons and spells that grant them. This is one of those parts where a spell needs to do what it does for overall game balance, even though it is not matching the realm it is in.
5. Shatter
Cost : 8
Research : Double
Effect : Target normal unit must resist at -2 or their melee, thrown and missile attack is reduced to 1.
Effectively makes a normal unit unable to fight for half the price of Black Sleep, but with much more restrictions.
6. Warp Creature
Cost : 10
Research : Double
Effect : Target unit must resist at -5 or suffer one of these effects at random : 0 resistance, halved defense, halved attack.
Weaker than Shatter on the correct type of unit, but in exchange works on everything and offers a wider array of outcomes, this spell is quite versatile and can deal with most enemies. Resistance reduction can be taken advantage of by applying the other debuffs with a 100% chance. As it often takes multiple castings to have the desired outcome (or other resistance based spells following the resistance debuff), this spell is more useful in battles consisting of only one or two, very powerful enemy units.
7. Fire Bolt
Cost : 10
Research : Normal
Effect : Does a strength 20 Fire magical attack on the targeted unit.
The most basic direct damage spell with no particular strengths and weaknesses. Very cost-effective but due to somewhat low base power, it's not as powerful against high armor or number of figures.
8. Wall of Fire
Cost : 100
Maintenance : 0
Research : Normal
Effect : All units trying to enter or attack into the enchanted city suffer a strength 10 fire attack to all their figures.
Although strength 10 to all figures is quite overpowered for a common, this is limited to defending your own cities, balancing it out.
9. Warp Wood
Cost : 10
Research : Normal
Effect : Destroy all remaining missile ammo on a target unit.
A cheap, effective way to deal with enemy bowmen and similar early game units, and occasionally useful against a high end hero.
10. Disrupt
Cost : 5
Research : Half
Effect : Destroys targeted section of city wall.
A seemingly useless spell that actually can be quite decisive. For the low cost of 5, negating 2 out of the 3 defense bonus provided by the wall is not bad, and the ability to enter the city from unexpected directions to hit enemy ranged units first can win an otherwise impossible battle.
Cost : 40
Maintenance : 1
Research : Normal
Effect : Summoning 4 figures : Melee 4, Fire Breath 3, +1 To Hit, Defense 2, Resistance 5, Moves 3, 4 health.
Used to be one of the best common summons in the game, now after all the rebalancing, this creature feels slightly unimpressive. Roughly as powerful as a unit of Cavalry in health and defense, and having identical cost, but requiring mana and casting skill, I feel it should be buffed up a very slightly. The ability to attack flying units is excellent at this early in the game, though. The main concern is the attack power, although 2x 3 attack is pretty good in theory, almost everything in the game has enough armor aside from Spearmen and ranged units to significantly reduce that damage. An increase to 4 melee might be needed.
2. Corruption
Cost : 40
Research : Half
Effect : Corrupts the target land square.
It destroys enemy minerals which is good, although not exactly what you usually want to cast in the very early game. Reduction of food and production bonuses from terrain has a marginal effect on the enemy because the other tiles and cities will still produces resources, but it can critically hurt a city on bad terrain with only a few tiles of food producing land. Can be useful against enemies that play a race with no Shaman or Priest unit. Becomes obsolete as soon as you get Raise Volcano. Due to the common ability "Purify" removing this spell is not an option, but the effect feels somewhat underwhelming. The catch with this spell is, if you are actively at war with the target, you will eventually get the terrain at which time this spell will backfire, and the effect only helps on long term. If you aren't at war, you don't want to cast this because you can't stop them from cleaning it up, and it would also worsen relations, making them start a war at which point, see previous sentence.
Not sure how to make this useful, and the game does need this spell for the AI to cast it against you.
Would need to test whether spamming it against an enemy can cause enough food shortage to actually help winning an early game war. I suspect not, since shore tiles cannot be corrupted but produce food anyway.
9. Flame Blade
Cost : 10/50
Maintenance : 1
Research : Half
Effect : Enchanted normal unit gains +3 melee attack, and +2 missile or thrown attack and can ignore Weapon Immunity.
At a boost of 3, this is now as good as Lionheart's offense part, which is good enough for an uncommon spell.
4. Fire Elemental
Cost : 20
Research : Normal
Effect : Summons a Fire Elemental (now has Weapon Immunity).
A rather weak single figure combat summon, with a unique speciality : Weapon Immunity, which is pretty much a guaranteed win against early game normal units not having magical weapons. Not very Chaos-like, but definitely powerful enough, and occasionally useful in the midgame as well (if enemies without magical weapons attack). I don't see too many options on how else to make it useful though, and early game Weapon Immunity is needed somewhere to provide a use for magical weapons and spells that grant them. This is one of those parts where a spell needs to do what it does for overall game balance, even though it is not matching the realm it is in.
5. Shatter
Cost : 8
Research : Double
Effect : Target normal unit must resist at -2 or their melee, thrown and missile attack is reduced to 1.
Effectively makes a normal unit unable to fight for half the price of Black Sleep, but with much more restrictions.
6. Warp Creature
Cost : 10
Research : Double
Effect : Target unit must resist at -5 or suffer one of these effects at random : 0 resistance, halved defense, halved attack.
Weaker than Shatter on the correct type of unit, but in exchange works on everything and offers a wider array of outcomes, this spell is quite versatile and can deal with most enemies. Resistance reduction can be taken advantage of by applying the other debuffs with a 100% chance. As it often takes multiple castings to have the desired outcome (or other resistance based spells following the resistance debuff), this spell is more useful in battles consisting of only one or two, very powerful enemy units.
7. Fire Bolt
Cost : 10
Research : Normal
Effect : Does a strength 20 Fire magical attack on the targeted unit.
The most basic direct damage spell with no particular strengths and weaknesses. Very cost-effective but due to somewhat low base power, it's not as powerful against high armor or number of figures.
8. Wall of Fire
Cost : 100
Maintenance : 0
Research : Normal
Effect : All units trying to enter or attack into the enchanted city suffer a strength 10 fire attack to all their figures.
Although strength 10 to all figures is quite overpowered for a common, this is limited to defending your own cities, balancing it out.
9. Warp Wood
Cost : 10
Research : Normal
Effect : Destroy all remaining missile ammo on a target unit.
A cheap, effective way to deal with enemy bowmen and similar early game units, and occasionally useful against a high end hero.
10. Disrupt
Cost : 5
Research : Half
Effect : Destroys targeted section of city wall.
A seemingly useless spell that actually can be quite decisive. For the low cost of 5, negating 2 out of the 3 defense bonus provided by the wall is not bad, and the ability to enter the city from unexpected directions to hit enemy ranged units first can win an otherwise impossible battle.
Uncommon Spells
1. Raise Volcano
Cost : 50
Research : Half
Effect : Turns target land square into a volcano that produces power to the caster. Destroy existing ores, 20% chance to produce a new ore. Volcanoes have a 1% chance to turn into mountains pet turn.
The stronger version of Corruption, this one cannot be removed by Purify and even if it does revert, Mountains still don't produce any food. Assuming an average lifetime of 100 turns for the volcano, twice the cost comes back in power.
2. Fire Storm
Cost : 180
Research : Double
Effect : Hits all figures in all units on targeted map square with a strength 12 fire magical attack.
Does almost as much damage as the original game's Flame Strike, although for 180 overland cost which is not cheap. Still, casting this on most garrisons ensures an easy victory in the following combat.
3. Immolation
Cost : 12/60
Maintenance : 2
Research : Normal
Effect : Enchanted unit has Immolation (when attacking an enemy unit in melee, all figures in that unit are hit with a strength 10 fire attack.)
Quite powerful and pretty valuable against most early and midgame units due to hitting all figures. Cheaper than fireball and if used properly, can trigger the effect several times, but it does need you to have a unit fight the enemy in melee.
4. Fireball
Cost : 15
Research : Normal
Effect : Hit all figures in the target unit with a strength 10 magical fire attack.
An excellent direct damage spell to use on multi-figure units, it can usually wipe out midgame or weaker normal units entirely.
5. Gargoyles
Cost : 110
Maintenance : 1
Research : Normal
Effect : Summoning 4 figures : Melee 5, +1 To Hit, Defense 9, Resistance 9, Moves 3, 4 health, Stoning Immunity, Poison Immunity, Flying.
Extremely hard to kill for an uncommon creature, Gargoyles can be a pretty good counter against low to mid tier multifigure units and anything that relies on poison such as Nagas, too.
Raised melee to 5, reduced cost to 110.
Main intended role for unit is to stall, while you clear out enemies with spells, or cast immolation on it so make it do good damage. I'm not sure if the 5 melee is necessary but it sure helps making the unit more useful without the above tactics, in which case it was pretty worthless without this buff.
6. Chimera
Cost : 250
Maintenance : 6
Research : Normal
Effect : Summoning 4 figures : Melee 10, Fire Breath 6, +1 To Hit, Defense 5, Resistance 8, Moves 3, 8 health.
Expensive but very powerful midgame unit that hits hard, is pretty durable and...not very good against resistance targeting spells.
7. Fire Giant
Cost : 125
Maintenance : 3
Research : Normal
Effect : Summoning 1 figure : Melee 18, Magical Ranged 12 (3 ammo), +1 To Hit, Defense 5, Resistance 7, Moves 3, 18 health, Mountaineer, Fire Immunity, Wall Crusher.
Gave this +3 health and the Fireball Spell, lowered cost to 125. See old comments below.
(Costs as much as a Stag Beetle but is actually not any stronger aside from having a rather limited ranged attack despite being a summoned unit. This has been buffed up several times but is still kinda unimpressive. Giving it a Fireball Spell ability, more armor, or more health could be needed.)
8. Lightning Bolt
Cost : 25
Research : Normal
Effect : Hits the target unit with a strength 35 armor piercing magical attack.
Not much to say about this, one of the best uncommon nukes in the game, second only to Reaper Slash which does not pierce armor and is blocked by Poison Immunity.
9. Mystic Surge
Cost : 25
Maintenance : 1
Research : Normal
Combat only unit enchantment. The enchanted unit gains 3 movement, 2 defense, additional random buffs, but loses 2 resistance, counts as fantastic for the duration of the battle, cannot be healed during the battle, and is lowered to 1 remaining hit point at the end of battle.
10. Chaos Channels
Cost : 50
Maintenance : 0
Research : Half
Effect : Enchanted creature randomly gains Flight, +3 Armor or a strength 4 Fire Breath.
All 3 effects are pretty decent (Fire Breath might be a bit underwhelming though, most units have enough armor to block it), especially as this is the only way Chaos can buff defense or enable flight, but the main selling point is turning the unit into a Chaos creature, which both makes it immune to some normal unit only curses, and makes it benefit from spells that power up Chaos Creatures (Chaos Surge, Survival Instinct, Warp Reality).
Rare Spells
1. Efreet
Cost : 450
Maintenance : 9
Research : Normal
Effect : Summoning 1 figure : Melee 15, Ranged 18 (8 ammo), +2 To Hit, Defense 7, Resistance 12, Moves 4, 27 health, Fire Immunity, Caster 40, Flying.
Attacks slightly better than a Catapult, and is as good as a Stag Beetle in melee. Also casts spells for 40 MP and flies. That's all really nice but 500 might be too expensive for a creature that is merely good at doing magic damage, so reduced to 450. 400 Might be too cheap.
2. Warp Lightning
Cost : 30
Research : Normal
Effect : Hits target with lightning bolts from strength 12 to 1.
Can deal even more damage than Doom Bolt for less MP, but is inefficient on targets buffed by Elemental Armor, Invulnerability, or those having extreme armor.
3. Doom Bolt
Cost : 41
Research : Normal
Effect : Target takes 10 unpreventable damage.
Most reliable direct damage spell in the game. Even more potent as there is no Righteousness to block it, although Healing Charge can counter it if the unit survives.
4. Flame Strike
Cost : 60
Research : Normal
Effect : All enemy units are hit by a strength 30 fire magic attack in combat.
Quite damaging but the price is steep, and average damage is only 9 per unit (further reduced by armor). Only the weakest units die to casting this once, but most armies eventually get wiped out if spammed repeatedly.
5. Doom Bat
Cost : 400
Maintenance : 7
Research : Normal
Effect : Summoning 1 figure : Melee 16, Doom, Defense 7, Resistance 9, Moves 6, 30 health, Flying, Immolation.
Now a rare, because there were too many uncommon summons. Doom damage like Chaos Spawn, but this one is faster, stronger, more expensive, and lacks the gaze attacks.
6. Magic Vortex
Cost : 50
Research : Normal
Effect : Summons a Magic Vortex which does damage to any units nearby and destroys buildings if moving through a city.
Despite the random nature, this is an extremely damaging spell which can turn around otherwise unwinnable battles.
Haven't had the chance to use it in an actual game since I started modding, though.
7. Blazing March (renamed Metal Fires)
Cost : 50
Research : Normal
Effect : All friendly units in combat gain +3 melee, missile and thrown attacks (including fantastic units). Also cumulative with Flame Blade.
New name is necessary because the original implies requiring a "weapon" so no fantastic units. Aside from that, the effect is satisfying, often superior to even Prayer (not to High Prayer though, and no defense part). Very good for the large amount of multi-figure units Chaos realm has and great for most normal units as well.
8. Chaos Rift
Cost : 300
Maintenance : 5
Research : Normal
Effect : Hits 5 units randomly with strength 11 lighting bolts each turn, and 5% random chance for each building inside to get destroyed per turn.
Pretty efficient at destroying buildings, the city enchanted by this is unlikely to remain capable of producing good military units for long. Even weakens defenses on top of that. Effectively a free Earthquake every 8 turns so it's better in cost after 16 turns.
9. Chaos Spawn
Cost : 350
Maintenance : 8
Research : Normal
Effect : Summoning 1 figure : Melee 1, Multigaze 4, Defense 8, Resistance 10, Moves 2, 22 health, Causes Fear, Flying.
Fills a similar role as Gorgons but is more fragile, while cheaper and more powerful at gaze attacks. Relies on finding low resistance enemies heavily, it has minimal damage output otherwise. Due to the vulnerability to ranged units, high resistance units, and having slow movement, cost most likely needs a reduction, 350 might be fair instead of 400.
10. Doom Mastery
Cost : 666
Maintenance : 18
Research : 33% less
Effect : All new units built are automatically enchanted by Chaos Channels.
A pretty useful spell considering the advantages of being a Chaos unit, moved to rare for better accessibility and more reasonable cost.
Very Rare Spells
1. Disintegrate
Cost : 50
Research : Normal
Effect : Target unit in combat with 9 or less resistance is instantly disintegrated.
My favorite combat spell in the game. Simple and efficient, you click on something and it dies, never to come back. If they have too much resistance, you need to lower it first, but there are heroes with spells for doing that in the game.
2. Meteor Storm
Cost : 800 (+40% for AI)
Maintenance : 10
Research : Normal
Effect : Destroys random buildings in all enemy cities. Enemy figures outside cities are hit with a strength 6 magical attack each turn.
Hurts everyone else and even prevents new outposts from growing into cities. Can also stop certain types of units from ever reaching you for an attack. A pretty powerful spell.
3. Armageddon
Cost : 1250 (+40% for AI)
Maintenance : 40
Research : 33% higher
Effect : Randomly raises volcanoes on enemy territory, and all enemy cities have +2 unrest.
Probably the strongest global enchantment in the game. Not only does it permanently destroy terrain, making it impossible for enemy empires to survive on long term, but also increases own power base by a sizeable amount (~+400 can be expected after a while)
4. Doomsday
Cost : 1000 (+40% for AI)
Maintenance : 20
Research : 33% higher
Effect : Randomly corrupts enemy territory, and all enemy cities have +5 unrest.
The "small" version of Armageddon. The unrest is a major blow to the economy of all other players, and corruption, if unchecked, eventually destroys their cities. Feels redundant, might be better as a rare, but honestly this is far too nasty for anything but Very Rare. Removing it and replacing with a completely new global enchantment is another option, but the other enchantments already pretty much cover everything there is to destroy perfectly. A flat +5 unrest, although not the most interesting, is a significant and unique effect (Armageddon also adds some, but the amount on it is far less, not enough to really matter on its own).
5. Apocalypse
Cost : 65
Research : Normal
Effect : Hits all enemy units with one of the following at random : Doom Bolt, Disintegrate at -3, Warp Creature at -15, Strength 30 fire attack, unresistable Confusion, Warp Lightning, Chaos Channels, Healing Charge
6. Hydra
Cost : 480
Maintenance : 11
Research : Half
Effect : Summoning 9 figures : Melee 9, Fire Breath 6, +1 To Hit, Defense 4, Resistance 12, Moves 2, 10 health, Regeneration.
Twice the health of any other units, and regeneration makes this creature pretty difficult to kill. Weak against armored targets (unless buffed) but unstoppable by anything else.
7. Great Drake
Cost : 500
Maintenance : 15
Research : Normal
Effect : Summoning 1 figure : Melee 39, Fire Breath 35, +3 To Hit, Defense 11, Resistance 15, Moves 4, 40 health, Flying.
By far the creature with the highest raw attack power, and no other tricks involved.
8. Warp Reality
Cost : 75
Research : Normal
Effect : All nonchaos units in combat have -2 To Hit.
When using chaos units in the army, this spell cuts enemy damage output to 33-60% without hurting the caster. Extremely powerful but slightly situational, I'm having doubts about the raised costs for this. It stacks with other - To Hit modifiers though for a nearly unstoppable combo. Now a very rare, which is suitable for the power level.
9. Call the Void
Cost : 500
Research : 33% more
Effect : All units in city take 12 doom damage, all buildings and population has a 66% chance to be destroyed. Land around city becomes corrupted randomly.
A surprisingly affordable cost for wiping out most of a city. Usually one is enough to severely damage it, two and it won't recover for the rest of the game! Repeated spamming can even clear out defending garrison entirely.
10. Chaos Surge
Cost : 1000 (+40% for AI)
Maintenance : 30
Research : 33% less
Effect : All Chaos units in game (including enemy units) gain +3 melee, +2 Breath, +2 resistance. Multiples cast by other wizards are cumulative but additional copies only add +1 to each stat instead of the full bonus.
Now provides a large enough bonus to be worth a very rare slot.
Item Powers
Flaming
Cost : 300
Books required : 2
Albeit an uninteresting bonus to attack which you can get anyway, I do like the idea of Chaos being able to enchant 3 more attack strength into weapons than anyone else.
Lightning
Cost : 500
Books required : 3
Armor Piercing is always a good ability to have.
Doom (Chaos)
Cost : 1200
Books required : 4
Guaranteed damage is awesome, and makes + To Hit unnecessary.
Destruction
Cost : 600
Books required : 4
Changed to destroy the entire unit instead of top figure, making it different from the cheaper resist-or-die item powers.
Inner Fire (new)
Cost : 500
Books required : 3
Enchanted unit has Fire Immunity, Cold Immunity and Immolation.
