Caster of Magic Release thread : latest version 6.06!

[roarmalf]

There simply isn't an UI for that sort of thing because it originally never existed. I already removed the Web Spell from the Huntress in CoM II when I realized that can happen but I'm not sure what solution we prefer for CoM I.
In CoM II, I gave the hero +5% chance to hit to replace the web but that's not possible in CoM I, it's either +10% which we tried before and was too much, or something entirely different. Any suggestions?

I really like the uncounterable web spell for nodes. It sets it apart from other heroes in a way that a different bonus couldn't. If you really want to change it because of the bugged interaction, I would say that giving a scouting bonus would be on theme. You could do something add Scouting II and give one additional base ranged attack and defense or HP.

[Seravy]

Well, we do have the other option of simply leaving things as is too, if that's preferred. It's not that common to have the hero handle an artifact that casts spells. Scouting and +1 or 2 ranged attack might work if we do want to remove it.

[WhiteMage]

I vote for Scouting II and +1 range attack while removing Web. As nice as Web is not having a bug is top priority IMO. But when item casting comes up it shows all spells in not castable dark. Why can't it hold and display 2 different spells there, maybe both marked as items, including the Web spell that is not item, but his own skill?

[Seravy]

Because "Web spell" is not a spell from the UI perspective, it's a special ability that can be cast by pressing the Spell button and selecting the unit, but does not go through any of the usual things spells do, like opening the spellbook.

It's functionally the same as a spell charge in an item but the UI is different.
In theory it might be possible to force these "spellabilities" to show up in the book and get used from there but it would be an unreasonable amount of work - if possible, might not be - and it's a feature not used by anything except that one unit so definitely not worth doing.

[roarmalf]

Bug:

In combat, casting heroism on a low level hero with Logistics has undesirable results:

Movement is not immediately added to units, instead it is added either:
1. when a unit is killed (I assume this triggers some check of active bonuses, likely due to holy bonus, etc.)
2. the start of a new round

This wouldn't really be an issue, but as an added result, any unit that cast a spell and gained movement can act with their bonus movement to cast a spell or attack. It does not enable multiple ranged attacks, but I didn't try with physical attacks as it wasn't practical.

So if I have 6 magicians in combat and cast spells with 5 of them, then cast heroism myself, then use the 6th Wizard to cast a spell that kills a unit, all my magicians can now attack/cast a spell.

Obviously an extremely rare situation, but I'm not sure if it can occur with other sudden movement gains, I don't think it happens with mystic surge, so I'm guessing not. This was repeatable in multiple battles, but if you want a save I can send one.

[Seravy]

The way this works is the unit keeps track of how many attacks it did when recalculating movement, so if it already did two melee attacks, it shouldn't gain any movement. I probably forgot to make casting spells set that variable. I'll add it to my list of bugs to fix.

[Anskiy]

Bug: When a 9 zombie lair successfully kills attackers and has slots freed up to accept undead defenders, it does not display the undead creation screen, and the converted units are normal, not undead.

[Seravy]

Wait, how can a 9 zombie lair raise undead? Wouldn't that put it over the unit threshold?

[Anskiy]

My war bears killed a few zombies before dying to them

[Seravy]

Right click on Army => Taki freezes the game if I right click the other 4 heroes first (repeatable). Mouse moves but nothing can be clicked. I remember this was my very first crash bug specifically with Taki I found in 1994 and apparently still there in COM.

Save attached.

I found what causes this. When you mouse over (or click) a hero, the game tries to locate that hero in the army list.
It basically looks if the hero is available in the current window, if not then resets the scrolling to the first row, and keeps going down one row at a time until the unit is found.
That works in theory except there is a problem : while scrolling down, it only refreshes the data of what unit is in which army row and column. However to find the unit, it loops as many times as there are clickable areas containing units on the screen.
As only the data (what unit is in which clickable area) is refreshed, without the clickable areas themselves (including how many there are total), this loops a random amount of time, possibly skipping some units. If the hero is skipped on each possible scrollbar setting, it freezes in an endless loop.
The solution should be to store the total number of units in the array somewhere while recalculating the data, so it doesn't have to be taken from the "number of clickareas" which aren't refreshed.