Caster of Magic Release thread : latest version 6.06!

[Seravy]

Ok, I'm going to be taking a little break from my game (and did you see that one Raven stack? djinns and sky drakes.. uggh), and maybe a little OT, but I do plan on sending you some money at some point via paypal Seravy. You definitely deserve it, what youve done is more than most of the previous companies have done to fix their 4x games.

Amazing, thanks. I find it funny that a single person can do more than an entire company...shows how capitalism completely fails. And copyrights, those are the worst thing ever invented...see how much better the result is if you don't have to start from nothing and can work with what has already been produced? Imagine if that was happening in science, not entertainment...
And look at those new MoM clone games, they're a joke. They don't even run on my computer...they had millions of $ and all they managed is that?

By the way, what I'm working on right now is teaching the AI to calculate the save modifier on items when using heroes to cast spells. Such a powerful feature and it wasn't taken advantage of, can't let it stay that way
Looks like it's working, I managed to make Serena disintegrate my Djinn. Now the remaining spells...

[b0rsuk]

http://www.realmsbeyond.net/forums/showt...p?tid=3650

[Seravy]

http://www.realmsbeyond.net/forums/showt...p?tid=3650

Let's see there...
First of all, I don't think there are any spells in the game left that I would want to remove and replace with a new spell, mainly.

Death's Call

This one has a huge balance problem. You pay 15 regardless of the unit. 15 for a Great Wyrm or Drake?
Animate Dead used to allow keeping revived enemy units as a bug, and even that was way broken for 50.
Every current way of making undead has a cost that scales with the value of the target. You need more Life Drains, more Syphon Life, more zombies, or a stronger Life Steal unit to get that better enemy unit on your side. Even in strategic combat, you need more casting skill and/or death books, or more/stronger undead making ability units to get the more expensive enemy creature.
This spell and the old animate dead throws this rule out and just says "you pay X for any creature in the game".
Now you might say "but I have to kill the unit first", problem with that, you can. There are a million ways in the game to kill units way stronger than your army and most of these are worth the effort if you get a free top tier unit.

Rebuild

Interesting but no interface for selecting the building, or even to target a city with destroyed buildings, no such targeting type exists.

Mana Flare

This one is interesting. My main concern is, it's not AI friendly. It's way too hard to judge when to cast it. I would probably keep it in red though.
I used to play this card a lot in MtG. It was an amazing combo with Jokulhaups. Not to mention Palinchron.

Summon Kraken

None of the existing fantastic creatures are one I would want to remove to make room for a new one.

Infection

Interesting but removing Life Drain isn't an option, it's the only common direct damage spell in Death. This is too situational to be a replacement for it, would be fine if both existed. Maybe instead of weakness? But that's a really nice spell...and it would leave Death with no spells that reduce enemy unit stats.
Now, if Reaper Slash would do this on top of the current effect, like "does a strength 30 poison attack plus 2 strength for each point of damage already on the unit" that would be interesting. I'll consider this. Though...no, this would ruin Death's only way to damage a super-resistanct high armor hero or other unit. The main selling point of Reaper Slash is to be able to damage things that are otherwise invincible.
I actually think this spell has an inherent flaw. If you could already deal damage to the unit equal to half its health or more then...you don't usually need a spell to finish it off. But if you couldn't then this would do nothing at all. I don't really see a case where I can think "oh, THIS is what I need to beat that". I would rather have the opposite spell, Final Fantasy style "Demi" or "Gravity", deal more damage the more health the thing has. Would be overpowered of course since it ignores the "cost more for more effect" rule, so doesn't belong to this game either.

Rebellion

There usually are no neutral cities left by the time rare spells are reached, and in general this spell is useless after the early game.

Corruption
Now also destroys roads.

Destroying roads, huh. Interesting. Far too good for just 40 mana crystals and at common, though. A hole in a road network can easily cost hundreds of gold of income. Maybe for Raise Volcano? I'm not sure, rebuilding roads is a huge pain...

Fire Elemental
Gets Immolation.

Immolation is way too strong in the mod, also it's uncommon tier.

Mana Focusing becomes Astrologer. The bonus is kept, but additionally you always know in advance what the next event global will be. And when the current lasting event will end.

Already have a different Astrologer. Events aren't decided in advance so there is nothing to actually show the player. (well 1 turn in advance for some but that's not very useful)

Conjurer
Now also starts knowing the Summoning Circle spell

Good idea but Conjurer is already one of the best retorts and SC has very low research cost.

Water lairs
Can't be entered by land units. This should make water more valuable. Water lairs would generate monsters too, but perhaps not as often, and only if there are ships on the same plane. (Ideally, there would be water nodes, so wizards constantly have something to fight over...)

Nice but I don't think I can do it, far too large scale change.

Nature Mastery, Chaos Mastery, Sorcery Mastery
Now you can also see the node's aura before it has been conquered.

I would totally do this if these retorts still existed. Not for Astrologer (current Node mastery) though, it already does a lot of stuff and is pretty powerful. I guess it would be in theme though...
One thing here, I noticed the game starts to lag on the overland map if all the nodes are melded (even if they're not in the visible screen area) so I think the auras are slowing it down. An ability that turns all of them on at once might be problematic due to that.

Nightshade has already been improved. Although there is no new plant type resource, there is Orihalcon instead.
Still need to read the rest, wow that's a long thread.

[b0rsuk]

Death's Call

This one has a huge balance problem. You pay 15 regardless of the unit. 15 for a Great Wyrm or Drake?
Animate Dead used to allow keeping revived enemy units as a bug, and even that was way broken for 50.
Every current way of making undead has a cost that scales with the value of the target.

So does Death's Call. The cost is in killing the creature without using that mana and casting points for something that helps you win the battle. I'm not saying it's perfectly balanced, but it IS an intriguing concept. If nothing else, it's a good starting point and can be balanced from there.

This spell and the old animate dead throws this rule out and just says "you pay X for any creature in the game".

"You pay X for any creature in the game you can kill without using spells".

Rebuild

Interesting but no interface for selecting the building, or even to target a city with destroyed buildings, no such targeting type exists.

Why is that a problem ? Opponent AI ? Other than AI, you could simply make the spell not do anything if used on a city without buildings destroyed.

Summon Kraken

None of the existing fantastic creatures are one I would want to remove to make room for a new one.

I disagree, because it's fundamentally different from other summons. Your loss. You could spice it up with perma-invisibility. Magic submarine.

Infection

Interesting but removing Life Drain isn't an option, it's the only common direct damage spell in Death.

Great, two birds with one stone! Direct damage is the most boring type of magic ever conceived. It stiffles creativity because direct damage can (and usually does) answer all problems. In many games it even usurps roles which would make sense filled with mundane weapons like bows. Manipulative magic leads to more interesting books and games. In post-DD books magic tends to work like a firearm substitute.

Another way of putting that, quoting the designer of POWDER (the roguelike) from memory: "I don't add spells which don't require new code."

Yes, I know you're working with reverse engineering and it's hard. Sigh.

Rebellion

There usually are no neutral cities left by the time rare spells are reached, and in general this spell is useless after the early game.

True, but you could say so about your starting city. It becomes almost irrelevant as the game goes on, because it makes up a smaller and smaller fraction of your empire. Somewhat counter-intuitively, early game bonuses can translate into late game advantage. Getting a random neutral city would spice up the game, especially on the far end of the map. And AI knows how to use a city. Are you honestly saying that another direct damage spell is a more interesting replacement for Recall Hero ?

Corruption
Now also destroys roads.

Destroying roads, huh. Interesting. Far too good for just 40 mana crystals and at common, though. A hole in a road network can easily cost hundreds of gold of income. Maybe for Raise Volcano? I'm not sure, rebuilding roads is a huge pain...

[/quote]
I thought maintaining armies was one of your design goals ? Why not maintaning engineers ?

Maybe you could rewrite the gold income code to work based on pathfinding cost between cities, not existence of roads ? Then a single square of missing road wouldn't turn off income benefits abruptly. It doesn't make sense for income bonus to work like power lines in the first place. Roads would be just a factor in the formula.

By the way, the way most strategy games treat water, water transport and water trade is abominable. Building near water is something you usually avoid!

Already have a different Astrologer. Events aren't decided in advance so there is nothing to actually show the player. (well 1 turn in advance for some but that's not very useful)

I know that. But it's more fun when they're not generated at the last possible moment. More robust design. I think Spelunky had crate contents determined at last second, but then he added Spectacles item which let player look into crate/urn/pot contents, and it required some code redesign. That's the core point: it would be FUN to be able to predict events.

Prophet, Seer, Oracle

Still need to read the rest, wow that's a long thread.

Have fun looting the thread. If you want an idea to die, keep it to yourself.

I haven't tried your mod yet, but I have a feeling I might not like it. On the other hand you posted in the other thread I made (What parts of MOM you can't stand).

[Nelphine]

Engineers usually take one turn to build. Rebuilding roads is super easy.

[b0rsuk]

Death's Call

This one has a huge balance problem. You pay 15 regardless of the unit. 15 for a Great Wyrm or Drake?

Umm, no. It looks like I already thought about that years ago:

Death's Call
Death
Combat spell
Common
15 mana
Replaces Black Sleep, which becomes a monster-only spell, much like Summon Demon.

Hostile enchantment, usable only on normal enemy units. No chance to resist except immunity. The unit behaves normally in combat, but if you win the battle and the unit dies, it comes to your side as a created undead.

So basically this is a handicap in combat, because you spend mana and get no benefit during the same fight. I think the "created, throwaway undead" theme of Death magic should be expanded.

Normal. As in: not fantastic. Not summonable. Converting a Great Wyrm was your idea :P.

[Nelphine]

Eh, still leaves your sprites stealing hammerhands/orc hordes/war trolls/mammoths. Which your sprites were going to beat anyway, so its not like you needed the mana. Would be terrifying for early neutrals.

[Seravy]

Getting a random neutral city would spice up the game, especially on the far end of the map. And AI knows how to use a city.

I meant that there are no neutral cities on the map aside from the early game, in 95% of the games.

Are you honestly saying that another direct damage spell is a more interesting replacement for Recall Hero ?

Actually yes, I do. Heroic Shout is not just another direct damage spell. It's a game mechanic that makes heroes better and multi-figure units riskier to use.

Maybe you could rewrite the gold income code to work based on pathfinding cost between cities, not existence of roads ?

Don't think I can do that and it's definitely far too much work.

But it's more fun when they're not generated at the last possible moment.

And then we are talking about weeks of working to redesign the entire event system. Space for altering a code isn't exactly abundant there either.

Eh, still leaves your sprites stealing hammerhands/orc hordes/war trolls/mammoths. Which your sprites were going to beat anyway, so its not like you needed the mana. Would be terrifying for early neutrals.

Pretty much this. We are talking about a game where killing units is free if you use the correct strategy. It only takes a flying or invisible ranged unit to be able to kill (almost) anything you want. Or one with high armor. Or one with Fear if the target has low resistance. Or regenerating units that don't take damage anyway.
The other problem, it creates a self-sustaining cycle. You use the unit you got from this spell to kill another identical unit. On average you'll gain and lose the same amount of units because they are identical. So you lost the one attacking, but got it replaced by the raised one. The net effect : You kill a unit identical to anything you already have, for 15 MP. Which is again way too good, I mean, even if it's just normal units, you pay 15 for something that has a production cost of 100-200.

If you want an idea to die, keep it to yourself.

You were the one asking the question why I'm not adding these to the mod. So I went out of my way to answer that. And now you're saying not to? Whatever, I guess I'm done replying then.

[b0rsuk]

Quote:
If you want an idea to die, keep it to yourself.

You were the one asking the question why I'm not adding these to the mod. So I went out of my way to answer that. And now you're saying not to? Whatever, I guess I'm done replying then.

That was a general statement about ideas.

If you're going to ignore a thread packed with good ideas, be my guest. Get offended as much as you wish. That's a novel design concept.

Are you honestly saying that another direct damage spell is a more interesting replacement for Recall Hero ?

Actually yes, I do. Heroic Shout is not just another direct damage spell. It's a game mechanic that makes heroes better and multi-figure units riskier to use.

You've reinvented Fireball. Also, Flame Strike, Immolation, Wall of Fire, Firestorm...

I see you're trying to balance undead units by making them heal on their own. That can work but is... boring. Sure you can balance stuff by making it more similar (Warcraft I, II had near-perfect balance!!) but you're making it less distinctive in the process. The other way is to further explore the cannon fodder niche. You could go as far as to make created undead upkeep-free. They don't heal, they have no upkeep - fair game.

[Seravy]

Are you honestly saying that another direct damage spell is a more interesting replacement for Recall Hero ?

Actually yes, I do. Heroic Shout is not just another direct damage spell. It's a game mechanic that makes heroes better and multi-figure units riskier to use.

You've reinvented Fireball.

True but more sources mean it has a stronger effect on balance. Also, Fireball doesn't promote using heroes in combat for the early game.

I see you're trying to balance undead units by making them heal on their own.

Actually I don't. That's for death realm creatures, but created undead (and skeletons) are not included. And they don't have gold or food upkeep although that's same as the base game. The concept of undead is to provide easy access to large amounts of weak, nearly free units that don't heal. More expensive units should be much harder to convert. Creature undead on zombies, and the resistance rolls on other spells and abilities works well for that.

If you're going to ignore a thread packed with good ideas, be my guest. Get offended as much as you wish. That's a novel design concept.

I didn't say I'll ignore the thread. However I'll not bother talking about what I think about the ideas I find.