Community Patch(er)

[drake178]

MOMDIFFP.ZIP

Master of Magic Differential Patcher
by drake178



The purpose of this package is to allow updating Master of Magic to the latest
Community Patch version in a relatively easy and straightforward manner,
without requiring Slitherine's launcher (or version even). But it does more
than that. It allows converting from any version to any other from the
following list:

v1.20
v1.30
v1.31

v1.40n
v1.50
v1.51
v1.52.03
v1.60 (the current Community Patch)

It can also downgrade any version to (and revert from there):
v1.00
v1.01
v1.10

However, these versions did not have all the data files that the later ones do,
and can unfortunately not be updated from directly (the internet archive has
copies of the Simtex/Microprose v1.31 updater, which should be sufficient to
bridge the gap).


The distributed archive should contain 3 files:

* MOMDIFFP.EXE (a 16-bit DOS executable requiring DOS 3+, e.g. DOSBox)
* MOMDP_32.EXE (a 32-bit windows executable that runs even on WinXP)
* MOMDIFFP.TXT (this file)

The DOS program should ensure that the the patcher runs on any system that can
launch the original game itself. To use either executable, it needs to be
copied into the game's folder and ran from there. The windows version offers a
dropdown box for target version selection, while the DOS one takes a -v:XXXX
switch (e.g. type "MOMDIFFP -v:1.01" without the quotes to downgrade to 1.01).
The default in both cases is the latest version.



Note that no texts (other than this file), change logs, or individual FILESET
patches are included in this package. Please refer to the Master of Magic wiki
(masterofmagic.fandom.com) for the latest information on the Community Patch,
or for the change logs of the unofficial patches before it (1.40n - 1.51).



DISCLAIMER: this package contains no copyrighted material. The executables are
NOT self-extracting archives. They contain instructions on how to build the
files of one version from those of another. No more than 10% of scrambled data
from any given file is possible to recover from the package without access to
an original version of that file.

The windows executable was created with lazarus / free pascal. The DOS patcher
was hand-crafted in a hex-editor. You are free to do with them whatever you
want. However, they are distributed "as is", and I accept no liability for any
damage they may cause.

That said, if you do happen to run into any problems while using the patchers,
you can get in touch with me through the MoM wiki, or by sending an email to
"drakespam" at gmail.com.

Special thanks to Stefan for the v1.00 files!

[resnet34]

I'm running this version from a GOG launcher, I keep getting a bug with the partial occlusion of cities. Anything that could be done about it?

https://imgur.com/a/VFGbjk4

[drake178]

I'm running this version from a GOG launcher, I keep getting a bug with the partial occlusion of cities. Anything that could be done about it?

https://imgur.com/a/VFGbjk4

Of course, you can. Build City Walls. =)

It's not a bug, that's the original non-walled graphic for a hamlet. You didn't see it in v1.31 because they messed up the code. I'll eventually add a display option for old-timers to use only the walled graphics, but it's going to be a while.

But, if it really, really, really bothers you, you can apply this patch with FILESET (it's a reversal of the W523 fix):

4E87C
FF
00
4E902
FF
00
D2A8F
FF
00
D2B15
FF
00

You need to be able to access the DOSBox command prompt for this though. Let me know if you need help with that.

[resnet34]

I'm running this version from a GOG launcher, I keep getting a bug with the partial occlusion of cities. Anything that could be done about it?

https://imgur.com/a/VFGbjk4

Of course, you can. Build City Walls. =)

It's not a bug, that's the original non-walled graphic for a hamlet. You didn't see it in v1.31 because they messed up the code. I'll eventually add a display option for old-timers to use only the walled graphics, but it's going to be a while.

But, if it really, really, really bothers you, you can apply this patch with FILESET (it's a reversal of the W523 fix):

4E87C
FF
00
4E902
FF
00
D2A8F
FF
00
D2B15
FF
00

You need to be able to access the DOSBox command prompt for this though. Let me know if you need help with that.

Thanks, so you are saying this is not a bug. That's fine, thanks. 

Some of the most confusing features are Illusion-related: 

1) Illusion unit ab, Illusion damage, Illusionary attack. In case the attacker has this ab, it delivers base physical damage with illusion component that bypasses Magic immunity (no defence rolls), but not Illusion immunity (normal defence rolls). This includes ranged magical damage. At the same time, Psionic blast spell also delivers magical + illusion damage, hence it is identical to, say, shamans with illusion ab using ranged magical attack. Yet for some reason in this case, Magic Immunity fully discards this attack, and Illusion immunity is the same as above. This is highly confusing.

2) Blur spell, the patch details are: Blur works as intended, no rolls are lost on successes and Illusion Immunity is no longer checked on the wrong unit. The way I understood this, is that the friendly unit gets the benefit of Blur, and enemy unit with Illusion immunity ignores this spell. How does magic immunity work in this case? It's not mentioned in the manual, and the 1) case is very confusing, 

3) Units with Illusion immunity ab or True sight are fully immune to 4 Sorcery spells listed here, and partly to 2 more (Psionic Blast and Banish) + invisibility. At the same time, units with Magic immunity cannot be targeted only by 3/4 spells from above, and it is not mentioned in Confusion at all. So how does it work? Even more confusing, Illusion immunity doesn't work against Banish for some reason, although both Banish and Creature Binding check Resistance (why resistance?). How does magic immunity work in this case? Neither of them are mentioned in the spell entry at all (link). 

Could you pls clarify this functionality.

[drake178]

1) Illusion unit ab, Illusion damage, Illusionary attack. In case the attacker has this ab, it delivers base physical damage with illusion component that bypasses Magic immunity (no defence rolls), but not Illusion immunity (normal defence rolls). This includes ranged magical damage. At the same time, Psionic blast spell also delivers magical + illusion damage, hence it is identical to, say, shamans with illusion ab using ranged magical attack. Yet for some reason in this case, Magic Immunity fully discards this attack, and Illusion immunity is the same as above. This is highly confusing.

2) Blur spell, the patch details are: Blur works as intended, no rolls are lost on successes and Illusion Immunity is no longer checked on the wrong unit. The way I understood this, is that the friendly unit gets the benefit of Blur, and enemy unit with Illusion immunity ignores this spell. How does magic immunity work in this case? It's not mentioned in the manual, and the 1) case is very confusing, 

3) Units with Illusion immunity ab or True sight are fully immune to 4 Sorcery spells listed here, and partly to 2 more (Psionic Blast and Banish) + invisibility. At the same time, units with Magic immunity cannot be targeted only by 3/4 spells from above, and it is not mentioned in Confusion at all. So how does it work? Even more confusing, Illusion immunity doesn't work against Banish for some reason, although both Banish and Creature Binding check Resistance (why resistance?). How does magic immunity work in this case? Neither of them are mentioned in the spell entry at all (link). 

Could you pls clarify this functionality.

1) The game differentiates between attacks made by a figure of a unit, and attacks made by a spell. Ranged magical attacks are the former. This is the same distinction as that between the Fire Breath of a Great Drake, and a Fire Bolt spell (both are "magical" fire damage), although it's certainly easier to discern it in that case. The result is that while both are "magical" damage with an illusion component, a ranged attack made by the Illusionist hero (or shamans with the Illusion ability) is not the same as a Psionic Blast cast by that hero.

When a spell makes a Conventional Damage attack, it checks whether the target has Magic Immunity before resolving that attack. If so, it cuts the process short and deals no damage, period. By contrast, an attack made by a figure of a unit has no such check, and will proceed to resolving the damage regardless of the target's immunities. This is likely the reason for your confusion right here, as if this check was not done, your example attacks would be much more similar with respect to your specific question (but they would still not be the same in general, as one can benefit from the attacker's respective +To Hit modifier, while the other can not).

During the resolution of a Conventional Damage attack, unless it deals Doom Damage, the game has to calculate the defender's effective Defense against that attack at some point, as this sets out the number of Defense dice the target gets to use. This is where Illusion Damage applies. If it's present, and the target is not immune to illusions, then the effective Defense is simply set to zero, bypassing all other modifiers with the exception of that granted by City Walls. The Defense bonus of Magic Immunity is one such modifier. As such, it has no effect against Illusion Damage unless it either nullifies it completely (i.e. if the attack came from a spell), or the target has Illusions Immunity as well.

In total, Magic Immunity has three distinctive effects. First, it negates spell damage. Second, it raises the bearer's Defense to 50 (if it was less) against any non-melee attack associated with a realm. This is a conditional Defense modifier, and is what normally catches ranged magical attacks, but also fire breath and lightning breath, and is duplicated with a further realm restriction by the Righteousness enchantment. Finally, Magic Immunity grants a bonus of +30 on all Resistance rolls made against any negative effect associated with a realm. This ties into 3) though, so more on it there.


2) In v1.31, Blur checks for Illusions Immunity on the defending unit instead of the attacking one. Essentially, units with Illusions Immunity could never benefit from Blur, and would not negate the effect on the opponent either. In addition, for every point of damage blocked, v1.31 decreases the remaining damage to be checked by an additional point outside the loop decrement, meaning that no matter how lucky the rolls, Blur could never prevent more than 50% of the damage and, on average, would reduce it by much less than the described 10%. Both of these bugs are fixed in the Community Patch. As for Magic Immunity, it does not interact with Blur in any way whatsoever.


3) Which spells can and can not be cast on targets against which they will have no effect is an issue of some debate. Some say the game should not allow you to cast, while others are of the opinion that this is something you should remember yourself. The game does it both ways, with no consistency whatsoever. At least not that I (or anyone else I know) could perceive.

In the case of Illusions Immunity though, this is actually very straightforward. Whatever spell this ability fully protects against, you can't cast on a target possessing it. It is not mentioned in the article on Banish because the two have nothing to do with each other. The wiki article on the immunity likely mentions Banish because of the silly text the game gives when trying to target an illusions immune unit with a spell that the immunity triggers against: it states "That unit is immune to Sorcery spells" instead of providing an actually accurate error message (the trigger condition, for the record, is whether the spell being cast is a Sorcery Unit Curse).

As for Magic Immunity, contrary to what you wrote, all of the spells you implied can be targeted at magic immune units. There is no warning whatsoever. They just won't work, if nothing else, then by virtue of the third effect of Magic Immunity that I described above. +30 Resistance is enough to make every spell or negative effect in the game fail regardless of all other circumstances. The only Resistance rolls that Magic Immunity doesn't help with are those made against poison, which is intentionally not associated with any of the magical realms. This is also why Magic Immunity is not noted in the article on Banish: neither are the umpteen other effects that raise or lower the target's Resistance score, conditionally or otherwise.


PS.: I was going to revise all of the damage type articles on the wiki, but unfortunately I got side-tracked, and then side-tracked from my side track. I apologize. I did, however, manage to pool all of my knowledge on the subject into the Conventional Damage (linked above) and Special Damage articles, I'd recommend you read those instead of the individual ones if you have further questions. Or, you can also ask here or there, of course.

[resnet34]

[quote pid="799676" dateline="1637539181"]

Thanks, but some points are still confusing. What you are essentially saying is that battle spell (e.g. Fireball, with or without Illusion) and ranged magical attack (e.g. High Men magicians, with or without Illusion) are different. Both are Ranged Magical Attacks and both deliver (Ranged) Magical Damage. I think the only place it is mentioned (just mentioned, without additional explanation) is here:

On the Master of Magic Wiki, for simplicity and style, the strength of a spell will often be marked in the same way as a Ranged Magical Attack, using a  Bolt icon followed by a number. That number is the amount of Magical Damage delivered by the spell. This is convenient because there are very few differences in how Ranged Attacks and direct-damage spells are handled by the game, at least in terms of how they hurt their targets.

But these differences are, is obviously not explained. Also, this paragraph is preceded by Ranged Magical Attack paragraph, that only mentions units, not spells, although spells like Firebolt (Ranged Attack) deliver Ranged (Fire) Damage, which is is also Magical Damage.

In Magical Immunity entry, there are two very confusing paragraphs:

During combat, the majority of harmful spells - especially those targeted directly at the unit - will cause it no harm whatsoever. This includes all spells that deliver direct damage - they will cause none.

Terms like 'targeted directly' and 'direct damage', 'spell damage' are very unclear, I guess they mean spells like Firebolt, but I'm unsure of it.

and

A unit with Magic Immunity will shrug off the vast majority of enemy spells cast directly at it - being completely unaffected by them. Many indirect spells will also fail to affect the unit. Furthermore, whenever a unit with Magic Immunity is struck by Magical Damage of any kind, its Defense rating is temporarily raised to  50 for purposes of averting that damage.

But spells like Firebolt (Range Attack) deliver Fire Damage, which is also Magical Damage, just like High Men Magicians damage! So will the spell trigger 50 Defence or get fully discarded?

At the same time, it says that they both deliver Magical Damage.

Overall, my point is that the difference between unit ranged magical attack +magical damage and spell ranged magical attack+magical damage are not really explained. This is why discarding vs +50 defence is unclear. This also applies

Also, I still don't get why Confusion and Blur bypass Magical Immunity.

On top of it, Chaos unit ranged magical attacks, do not deal Fire damage, although intuitively, they should.

I also found a couple of bugs so far:

1) Guardian Spirit can't attack flying units (Draconians)
2) Flying units (Draconians) don't attack ground units (perhaps only during sieges) if no flying/throwing/gaze enemy units remain.

[quote pid="799663" dateline="1637504760"]
1) Illusion unit ab, Illusion damage, Illusionary attack. In case the attacker has this ab, it delivers base physical damage with illusion component that bypasses Magic immunity (no defence rolls), but not Illusion immunity (normal defence rolls). This includes ranged magical damage. At the same time, Psionic blast spell also delivers magical + illusion damage, hence it is identical to, say, shamans with illusion ab using ranged magical attack. Yet for some reason in this case, Magic Immunity fully discards this attack, and Illusion immunity is the same as above. This is highly confusing.

2) Blur spell, the patch details are: Blur works as intended, no rolls are lost on successes and Illusion Immunity is no longer checked on the wrong unit. The way I understood this, is that the friendly unit gets the benefit of Blur, and enemy unit with Illusion immunity ignores this spell. How does magic immunity work in this case? It's not mentioned in the manual, and the 1) case is very confusing, 

3) Units with Illusion immunity ab or True sight are fully immune to 4 Sorcery spells listed here, and partly to 2 more (Psionic Blast and Banish) + invisibility. At the same time, units with Magic immunity cannot be targeted only by 3/4 spells from above, and it is not mentioned in Confusion at all. So how does it work? Even more confusing, Illusion immunity doesn't work against Banish for some reason, although both Banish and Creature Binding check Resistance (why resistance?). How does magic immunity work in this case? Neither of them are mentioned in the spell entry at all (link). 

Could you pls clarify this functionality.
[/quote]

1) The game differentiates between attacks made by a figure of a unit, and attacks made by a spell. Ranged magical attacks are the former. This is the same distinction as that between the Fire Breath of a Great Drake, and a Fire Bolt spell (both are "magical" fire damage), although it's certainly easier to discern it in that case. The result is that while both are "magical" damage with an illusion component, a ranged attack made by the Illusionist hero (or shamans with the Illusion ability) is not the same as a Psionic Blast cast by that hero.

When a spell makes a Conventional Damage attack, it checks whether the target has Magic Immunity before resolving that attack. If so, it cuts the process short and deals no damage, period. By contrast, an attack made by a figure of a unit has no such check, and will proceed to resolving the damage regardless of the target's immunities. This is likely the reason for your confusion right here, as if this check was not done, your example attacks would be much more similar with respect to your specific question (but they would still not be the same in general, as one can benefit from the attacker's respective +To Hit modifier, while the other can not).

During the resolution of a Conventional Damage attack, unless it deals Doom Damage, the game has to calculate the defender's effective Defense against that attack at some point, as this sets out the number of Defense dice the target gets to use. This is where Illusion Damage applies. If it's present, and the target is not immune to illusions, then the effective Defense is simply set to zero, bypassing all other modifiers with the exception of that granted by City Walls. The Defense bonus of Magic Immunity is one such modifier. As such, it has no effect against Illusion Damage unless it either nullifies it completely (i.e. if the attack came from a spell), or the target has Illusions Immunity as well.

In total, Magic Immunity has three distinctive effects. First, it negates spell damage. Second, it raises the bearer's Defense to 50 (if it was less) against any non-melee attack associated with a realm. This is a conditional Defense modifier, and is what normally catches ranged magical attacks, but also fire breath and lightning breath, and is duplicated with a further realm restriction by the Righteousness enchantment. Finally, Magic Immunity grants a bonus of +30 on all Resistance rolls made against any negative effect associated with a realm. This ties into 3) though, so more on it there.


2) In v1.31, Blur checks for Illusions Immunity on the defending unit instead of the attacking one. Essentially, units with Illusions Immunity could never benefit from Blur, and would not negate the effect on the opponent either. In addition, for every point of damage blocked, v1.31 decreases the remaining damage to be checked by an additional point outside the loop decrement, meaning that no matter how lucky the rolls, Blur could never prevent more than 50% of the damage and, on average, would reduce it by much less than the described 10%. Both of these bugs are fixed in the Community Patch. As for Magic Immunity, it does not interact with Blur in any way whatsoever.


3) Which spells can and can not be cast on targets against which they will have no effect is an issue of some debate. Some say the game should not allow you to cast, while others are of the opinion that this is something you should remember yourself. The game does it both ways, with no consistency whatsoever. At least not that I (or anyone else I know) could perceive.

In the case of Illusions Immunity though, this is actually very straightforward. Whatever spell this ability fully protects against, you can't cast on a target possessing it. It is not mentioned in the article on Banish because the two have nothing to do with each other. The wiki article on the immunity likely mentions Banish because of the silly text the game gives when trying to target an illusions immune unit with a spell that the immunity triggers against: it states "That unit is immune to Sorcery spells" instead of providing an actually accurate error message (the trigger condition, for the record, is whether the spell being cast is a Sorcery Unit Curse).

As for Magic Immunity, contrary to what you wrote, all of the spells you implied can be targeted at magic immune units. There is no warning whatsoever. They just won't work, if nothing else, then by virtue of the third effect of Magic Immunity that I described above. +30 Resistance is enough to make every spell or negative effect in the game fail regardless of all other circumstances. The only Resistance rolls that Magic Immunity doesn't help with are those made against poison, which is intentionally not associated with any of the magical realms. This is also why Magic Immunity is not noted in the article on Banish: neither are the umpteen other effects that raise or lower the target's Resistance score, conditionally or otherwise.


PS.: I was going to revise all of the damage type articles on the wiki, but unfortunately I got side-tracked, and then side-tracked from my side track. I apologize. I did, however, manage to pool all of my knowledge on the subject into the Conventional Damage (linked above) and Special Damage articles, I'd recommend you read those instead of the individual ones if you have further questions. Or, you can also ask here or there, of course.
[/quote]

[drake178]

Thanks, but some points are still confusing. What you are essentially saying is that battle spell (e.g. Fireball, with or without Illusion) and ranged magical attack (e.g. High Men magicians, with or without Illusion) are different.

That's exactly what I wrote. With all due respect, if you think you're well-informed enough to challenge that answer, then maybe you should be writing the wiki instead. For the record, respectively three and four paragraphs below what you quoted, there are explicit notes on Magic Immunity granting 50 Defense against Ranged Magical Attacks, but at the same time nullifying spell damage outright. In addition, one more paragraph below those you'll also find evidence of how outdated the article you quoted is, in general. I already apologized for not having gotten around to revising it yet. Would you like me to repeat that?

In Magical Immunity entry, there are two very confusing paragraphs:

During combat, the majority of harmful spells - especially those targeted directly at the unit - will cause it no harm whatsoever. This includes all spells that deliver direct damage - they will cause none.

Terms like 'targeted directly' and 'direct damage', 'spell damage' are very unclear, I guess they mean spells like Firebolt, but I'm unsure of it.

"Targeted directly" is the result of the author's inability to accurately describe something they lacked empirical knowledge of. You can safely ignore it. "Direct damage" is typically used in conjunction with the word "spell", in which case it refers to spells that deal Conventional Damage. "Spell damage" is a distinction that separates the damage caused by a spell from that caused by a figure of a unit and, in the case of Magic Immunity, is the determining factor for which of its effects will trigger against the attack that delivers this damage. "Spell damage" is usually restricted to an association with, again, Conventional Damage. While "special spell damage" would not be completely incorrect, it would be practically meaningless, as the difference in resolution can not be discerned in an un-modded game (realm-associated special damage dealt by units is nullified by Magic Immunity, while against spells it grants +30 Resistance, which is actually the exact opposite of its Conventional Damage behaviour).

A unit with Magic Immunity will shrug off the vast majority of enemy spells cast directly at it - being completely unaffected by them. Many indirect spells will also fail to affect the unit. Furthermore, whenever a unit with Magic Immunity is struck by Magical Damage of any kind, its Defense rating is temporarily raised to  50 for purposes of averting that damage.

But spells like Firebolt (Range Attack) deliver Fire Damage, which is also Magical Damage, just like High Men Magicians damage! So will the spell trigger 50 Defence or get fully discarded?

At the same time, it says that they both deliver Magical Damage.

Overall, my point is that the difference between unit ranged magical attack +magical damage and spell ranged magical attack+magical damage are not really explained. This is why discarding vs +50 defence is unclear.

That's another magnificent example of an author being unable to properly phrase their thoughts. However, if you read the sentences in the order they are written, you should be able to deduce that the third one only applies if the first one didn't. Fire Bolt is a spell. If it deals Conventional Damage - which it does -, then it will be nullified by Magic Immunity, ignoring all other considerations.

On the other hand, not all Fire Damage is spell damage, and neither do the Ranged Attacks of High Men Magicians deal Fire Damage, so your parallel there is completely off. The only common aspect of these two things is that they both deal, you guessed it, Conventional Damage.

You see, part of the problem here is that Conventional Damage has so many properties, that it is easy to state that any one source of it is very similar to any other. There's Attack Strength, Damage Types, Attack Rolls, chance To Hit, Defense, Defense Rolls, and interaction with game elements that affect one or more of the above. Instead of trying to understand how the underlying mechanics really work, the original author(s) of the wiki sadly decided to, pardon my language, pull it out of the *$$. Resulting in Fire Damage and Immolation Damage, Cold Damage and Blizzard Damage, Fear Damage (!), physical Magical Damage, and a bunch of other nonsense. Anything that they had a difficulty understanding was labelled "completely different" and anything they didn't was marked "very similar", the latter of which is what seemingly causes your own confusion.

There are at least four very important differences between "magical damage" delivered by a spell, and "magical damage" delivered by a Ranged Magical Attack. To Hit modifiers may apply to one, but never the other. Lead figure damage is considered by one, but not the other. City Walls protect from one, but not the other. Magic Immunity completely nullifies one, but not the other, against which it only raises Defense to 50. I'll let you figure out which of these statements apply to which damage source. Or, you could just read the wiki article on Conventional Damage.

Also, I still don't get why Confusion and Blur bypass Magical Immunity.

Confusion does not bypass Magic Immunity. Blur does, but that kind of makes sense to me, even if it doesn't to you.

On top of it, Chaos unit ranged magical attacks, do not deal Fire damage, although intuitively, they should.

Again, I disagree.

I also found a couple of bugs so far:
1) Guardian Spirit can't attack flying units (Draconians)
2) Flying units (Draconians) don't attack ground units (perhaps only during sieges) if no flying/throwing/gaze enemy units remain.

I'm afraid I'll have to disappoint you yet again. Neither of those are bugs. Guardian Spirits don't fly, and have no ranged or short-range attacks to engage flyers with. As for enemy flying units, the AI will no longer suicide those for you. Would you do that in their place? Still, given the amount of complaints that feature received over the years from players who got used to having it easy, I'm bound to eventually provide a patch feature that disables it. Unfortunately though, that won't be any time soon, I'm afraid.

P.S.: Oh, and just in case you missed it, here's the link again: Conventional Damage. And sorry about the tone. Having to repeat myself is kind of annoying. Please forget what you read elsewhere, read the article I linked, preferably slowly, from top to bottom, and if it's still not clear, I'll gladly discuss it some more.

[resnet34]

Well you are certainly welcome not to answer my questions if you feel you have to repeat yourself.


My confusion was about the fact that Magical Ranged vs Spell Ranged (aka direct) are different in some important ways, and the explanation thereof is  scattered across the wiki. 

Well, luckily, I found the solution on the Magic Immunity Spell entry, which draws a clear line between spell attacks and unit attacks, tyvm. I'm still clueless though why this explanation is not replicated in the Magic Immunity entry; instead, readers have to somehow infer it. Psionic Blast is a combat instant, and it is not on the list of exceptions in the main entry of Magic Immunity exceptions, so it is blocked by Magic Immunity.


Guardian Spirit is a swimming creature


Wrt the battle stalemate, it's certainly a glitch, because the only way to resolve the battle is either flee, or autoresolve, obviously both of them are suboptimal.

[drake178]

Well you are certainly welcome not to answer my questions if you feel you have to repeat yourself.

I wish it was that simple. You ignored my answers on the wiki and instead came here to repeat the same questions, out of all places, in a thread started by me. Only to do the same thing to my answer here...

My confusion was about the fact that Magical Ranged vs Spell Ranged (aka direct) are different in some important ways, and the explanation thereof is  scattered across the wiki. 

Your confusion was about the fact that spell attacks are not ranged attacks. That's why there is no bullet point list of their differences, the same way there isn't one for those between melee attacks and spell attacks. The explanation is all in one place, you just decided to ignore that one place.

Well, luckily, I found the solution on the Magic Immunity Spell entry, which draws a clear line between spell attacks and unit attacks, tyvm.

You're welcome, ironic as that is. But that will probably be lost on you =P

Guardian Spirit is a swimming creature

Nagas are swimming creatures.

Wrt the battle stalemate, it's certainly a glitch, because the only way to resolve the battle is either flee, or autoresolve, obviously both of them are suboptimal.

It's not a glitch. It's a price you pay for exploiting the rules to win despite your tactical inferiority. You probably know before starting the battle that this is what's going to happen, yet you start it anyway.

[Gaznak]

Man, you are a true genius, thank you a lotta lot for such a convenient tool!