DEATH Realm

[Seravy]

So, math why confusion and possession can't be changed to not act on the first turn after spell is cast?
Specifically when compared to direct damage spells?

That's not something that can be compared by math, they are fundamentally different things.
Confusion can't be changed, it's designed for the AI, and it has to be at least this good to be playable to the human. Units affected by confusions can STILL attack your units at a chance, and prevent you from winning battles while they are alive, forcing you to engage them at their full potential if they don't double KO with an enemy. Other direct damage spells or unit curses or save or die spells disable the enemy unit. (even shatter - at 1 attack power the unit won't be doing damage to you so it's as good as dead 99% of the time.)

Then modify wave of despair to do max damage against 3-5 units instead of always doing more damage individually if there are fewer targets.

We designed that spell to kill heroes that are in small enough armies (1-3 remaining units mainly) so that's not an option.
Too few units already weaken Despair : You get more damage/units but fewer units means less overall damage dealt. Maximal efficiency is already at 3-5 units - but you usually care to damage the single very rare instead of the 5 last units evenly. (and even if not, the others die to the first one or two waves)

Also gives added benefit that new players running around with a solo unit, say a favourite hero, don't get 'ambushed' by wave and lose that favourite unit without understanding why.

That's exactly what the spell exists for... (aside from the "death can't kill very rares" problem which idk why we even needed it to do, other realms don't kill very rares with spells either. Not 3 of them in 5 turns at least. I would say the AI needed it but the human won't use their very rares at small quantities so not really. I guess it does help against garrisons with 1 very rare in them though which is something a human might use - as the normal units are ineffective against Death.)

...I actually wonder if using Wave is even any better than using Reaper Slash x2...oh it is because those Wyrms have Elemental Armor on them. Otherwise it'd be almost the same thing (except wave is fewer turns). Maybe Wave still doesn't cost enough MP for what it does? idk. It kinda costs 2 direct damage spells of mana, and deals about that much damage, but in one turn against few enough targets. And fewer turns is worth paying slightly more usually. (and where ignoring defense matters, it's huge.)

[Nelphine]

Ok, I'm satisfied with wave of despair. It's been a while since we discussed it, but you're right.

However, I do NOT understand confusion.

It kills the confused unit. It doesn't need to do anything else. Everything else is ICING. So I don't understand. Why is attacking other units mandatory for either human or ai? Even at its current cost and save, it's still worth it - and if you use it on a high value target (like a halberdier... Which isn't exactly all that high) it's much better than direct damage ASSUMING it's only going to affect the unit it targets.


Edit: which is another way of saying, why can't you math it?

[Seravy]

Ok, so looked up damage data for Wave.
17.7 against the Great Wyrms in question if they are alone, for 66 is actually still more worth it than 10.2 for 32 on Repear Slash. Yes, Reaper is more economic (3.13 vs 3.72 MP/dmg) but WoD is 73% more damage per turn, well worth spending 20% extra MP, and it also ignores armor (and we already assumed 16 resistance so the damage only goes higher). Against 2-4 such targets, Wave is also more economic in all cases. For 5-7 targets, only if resistance is less.
So wave is pretty much strictly superior than any other option if the enemy army is 4 or fewer units. Now, those are uncommon spells so maybe that's acceptable although not ideal. But I suspect the 66 MP cost is still too low for it?

It kills the confused unit. It doesn't need to do anything else.

No, that's how the AI plays. The AI is ok with losing their city at the cost of killing two of the best units in the enemy army. (well, they aren't but that's the best they can do if the human is playing well)

I'm not ok with that. I will pick spells that ensure I'm winning the battle. "unit dies at end of battle" is not an effect I'm satisfied with as a human. If I'm a defender that means I lost a city. If I'm an attacker, that means I was under constant enemy fire for 25 turns. If neither is true, I was fighting a neutral.

However, assuming I do NOT wait for the battle to time out and confusion to kill the unit directly, that means I'm taking chances.
Either the unit kills enemy units and then I'm good, and it was very well worth it - or the unit attacks my units before doing that, wasting the whole spell - or the unit wanders around until the rest of the enemy army is killed and then I have to fight it to end the battle (failure to do so means the enemy is casting more spells, or the unit might eventually roll moving into my city or attacking my unit), wasting the spell (yes, the unit was delayed but I still need to fight it.).
Meanwhile Black Sleep has none of these side effects and costs 3 less MP. I rather take the 100% kill than the 50-50 shot of doing double or nothing UNLESS it's a battle I'm guaranteed to lose (in which case the end of combat effect means I'm taking a shot at kill or double kill instead, making it very good indeed.)

In other words, I cast spells in battle to win the battle at the highest chance possible, and end the battle in the fewest turns possible. Confusion is below average at both of those goals, in exchange for being better in situations where you can't avoid having a low chance to win the battle in the first place.

[Seravy]

Now comparing Wave to Annihilate.
Annihilate is, let's say 20% chance to kill a very rare, dealing an average of, idk, 40 damage to it?
That's 0.2*40 = 8 damage/use.
Less efficient than even a Reaper Slash. (5x Annihilate vs 5x Repear Slash both kill one great wyrm.)

So Annihilate is definitely underpowered, not just compared to wave but in general.
Ofc, Black Prayer can double this efficiency but that still means 16 damage/use while Wave is 20+. Sure Wave costs a lot more but considering more damage/turn is often more important than the MP cost, and the extra black prayer makes Annihilate compare worse on that than otherwise (if I divide the prayer on 3 annihilates, that makes them each cost 53 MP which is not that much less than 66 and pretty much means it's no longer more MP/turn nor damage/turn.)

(btw against 9 resistance rares Annihilate is actually better, being 60% to deal ~30 damage, so maybe very rares just have too much resistance? Those that do, even, we might as well look at them individually.)


(Wave : ~17-25 damage, ~2.5-4 MP/damage depending on enemy count and resistance, up to 4-5 units. )

Hydra - 12 resist, 30% chance to deal 90 damage = 27 damage. Annihilate is better.
Great Drake - 15 resist, 0% chance. With Black Prayer, 20% for 40 damage, so 8 damage. Wave is strictly better.
Death Knights - 10 resist, 50% chance for 36 damage = 18 damage. However Wave is unusable, so Annihilate wins.
Demon Lord - 13 resist, again Wave is unusable, Annihilate wins.
Archangel - 18 resist, Wave wins
Colossus  - 15 resist, Wave wins.
Behemoth - 13 resist, 20% chance for 45 damage = 9 damage. Wave is better.
Great Wyrm - 14 resist, 10% chance for 45 damage = 4.5 damage. Wave wins this one, even with Black Prayer included. (and urgency to kill these is higher than usual, too)
Djinn - 12 resist, 30% chance for 29 damage = 8.7 damage. Wave wins here too.
Sky Drake - immune to both.

So Annihilate is best against Hydra, Death Knights, Demon Lords. Wave is better for everything else very rare. Having Eternal Night up doesn't actually change which spell is better for any creature.

Against rares, Annihilate is 50-60% chance to kill for a typical damage amount of 30 on success, making it worth 15-18 damage. So for those it's better than Wave but usually worse than Massacre. (since that might have a lower chance but hits more targets and still has a decent 20-40% on each depending on available resistance reductions. And even against a single one, the ability to also kill half of the other 8 weak units makes it better.)

[Nelphine]

But, we're not letting the confused unit act on the first turn. That means it stays as an enemy to the confusion-casting wizard for the first turn. Which means it cannot be killed the first turn. In general confusion is cast on melee units, while they are far from the confusion-casting wizard. Which means, the only thing this change does, is always give the wizard controlling the unit one turn to dispel the unit, or flee the unit with its other units. 

It's still area denial (forcing the ranged units near the melee unit to choose between attacking the confusion-cadting units, or running away from the confused unit) .

Confusion right now already has exactly the same chance of lasting that long. This suggestion doesn't change that. This change only chooses the outcome on the very first turn instead of leaving it to chance.

[Nelphine]

Re: annihilate. Very rare resistance may have too much variance. Rares go from 8-12, so very rares should probably go from 11-15. Angels should include the holy bonus in this, so archangels should (for example) have a base resistance of 13. (Assuming we like the 11-15 range)

Edit: maybe 12-16 is better?

[Seravy]

This change only chooses the outcome on the very first turn instead of leaving it to chance.

However the first turn change is now consistent between the three spells that have this effect and that is a consistency we wanted and an effect we wanted to be this way. Not necessarily for confusion but definitely for Apocalypse (which actually uses confusion anyway). So changing it is not an option. (and note this was mainly decided for AI purposes and as an anti-hero mechanism for Chaos.)

Updated the very rare annihilate post meanwhile with numbers.

[Nelphine]

Right but we already know possession is too strong, but if we change it and not confusion, confusion is too strong.

So we change both confusion and possession, but put in an exception for apocalypse stating it can confuse on the first turn. It's very rare, so having it act differently is fine, both from balance, and from 'very rares do weird stuff anyway' so the player comprehension won't be an issue.

[Nelphine]

Re: very rare resistance. 10-18 is definitely too much variance. I'd increase death nights to 11, demon lords to 14; reduce colossus to the lowest of the nature at 13, make highest nature 14, 3rd nature either 13 or 14. Reduce archangels to 15 including the holy bonus. Increase djinn to 13. Not sure what demons are at bit I'd put them at 12 or 13 between the other 2 death.

Edit: no demon lords are super expensive. I'd make them 15 as well.

[Seravy]

I think the problem might be this :

Wave is better because it has a special condition - enemy army size must be low enough.
However, as it's the late game, you can afford first killing the other units (using massacre(s), and unit attacks) and then still do multiple waves afterwards on the last 4-5. So the special condition isn't preventing you from using the spell on 9 stacks anyway (unless the stack is all very rares but the AI almost never has that).
You can do that because the spell isn't expensive enough. At 66 MP, you can still use it 4 times after a massacre if you have 300 skill.

Also, in most cases the difference is huge - ~9 damage of Annihilate vs 20+ of the Wave. So it's not an amount that's easy to overcome unless you have eternal night and a free source of black prayer (hero or cloud). Basically Annihilate requires the target to be below 13 resist AND have a huge hp pool at the same time. Djinn might be 30+% to kill but at only 29 health it's not worth it anyway as that's no better than 20% on 40+ health. Variance isn't the problem - no creature is worth killing with Annihilate except the 90 health Hydras and the death units immune to all your other spells. In general you need to deal at least ~17 damage a turn to be equal to or better than Wave (less cost, same or less damage, no need to clear away other units), meaning a 50% chance on a 34 health creature, or a 35% chance on a 45 hp creature. So resistances of 10-12 which is way too low. Meaning we need more save modifier but then we are back to the "strictly superior to disintegrate" problem.

The only real solution would be if Wave had a high enough cost to NOT be an option if the enemy attacks with a stack of 9 that contains 1-3 very rares and many other crap. But even then some creatures would need a resistance revision maybe - if you can't actually kill them with Annihilate, too bad.
Alternately, if Annihilate wasn't irrecoverable and you could animate the thing you killed and then use that to kill the next and so on, then the spell would have a purpose. But we need it to be irrecoverable to destroy hero items and prevent enemy reanimation (since our best targets are still death creatures...)

(also since enemy units can be killed using attacks from your own units, not sure if higher wave cost really helps, aside from it not being spammable enough to actually kill all the remaining rares/very rares in one battle to begin with.)