Hi all, having a great time going back to this classic (partly thanks to the new patches - not that MOO needed them as badly as MOM does (but wonderfully has gotten!), I woulda played MOO 1.3 anyways :)
So using 140M3 (as I call it, the latest update by Sdragon that combines the battle scanner and over-autosave disable) I've started some games at average (used to play at hard and even impossible when I didn't care about how skewed the games became) and also installed a DOS screen cap TSR (Screen Thief - quite good). So to show off this new toy I'll post 2 GIFs from an early start as the Meowers who've got a REALLY big Bear breathing down their necks. Not to mention Ants in the pants (fights already but no official contact) on the other side. A Fertile 125 was at stake...
Playing on Expert difficulty (much more challenging than I anticipated) I watched a small army from a peaceful neighbor walk through my territory and start clearing out dungeons.
2 Elite Dark-Elf swordsmen + 2 Ghouls managed to take out 6 Gargoyles (gaining one as an undead), and then went on to clear a Chaos node (losing 2 units, but gaining a Fire elemental).
When I loaded up a save and tried these encounters myself, even a full-stack Army led by my (admittedly underpowered) hero got wiped out by these encounters. Now it's true that the other wizard has MUCH more magical power than I do, and so there may have been a lot of combat magic going on, but nonetheless I was surprised to see this minor force cut through major challenges like a knife through butter.
Do the AI Wizards gain some sort of bonus in auto-resolved combat? Or is this just the expected result of an army commanded by a powerful Sorceror?
While there are a ton of score modifiers that reduce the score, there are only a handful that increase score and (more importantly to me) increase the challenge without going up a difficulty level:
Plane of Water (1.15x): haven't played this one since I'm not too fond of oceans, but I'd imagine it doesn't actually make the game more difficult; just different
No Trading (1.25x): reduced spell variety; does sort of increase challenge although it's more of a "to taste" option in my opinion
Monsters Gone Wild (1.3x): I always play with this on; it does provide a nice difficulty bump, although some things like Call the Wild or a build tall strategy can completely defuse it
Against the Worlds (2x): the premier option for raising challenge. I've tried this option multiple times but never completed a game, primarily because enemy wizards just have so many units wandering around that each turn becomes an exercise in tedium, with endless minor battles happening.
So in short -- I think the options are pretty limited and I'd love if there were more. Can you guys suggest some that would be fun?
Here are my ideas so far:
Crabs in a Bucket: as long as the player is #1 overall, enemy wizards gain a large relations malus, becoming highly likely to declare war (basically an intensification of what already happens); becoming #1 in any sub-category such as population or military has a lesser, but similar effect. This is intended to be a more tolerable version of Against the Worlds.
Developed World: all enemy wizards start with 3-4 existing settlements with a couple more buildings than current, plus the usual settlers; player still just has one city
Developed Alternate Plane: all enemy wizards on the other plane start with 3-4 settlements; player's own plane starts as normal
The Old Empire: one of the enemy wizards starts off with 10+ settlements (depending on world size) scattered randomly around, uncommon level spells and a penchant for war. The idea being that there's an older empire that has mostly disintegrated, but is still an aggressive force
The Archmage's Return: in 1510, the past Archmage will return, spawning high-powered stacks of rare / some very rare creatures all over the world and beginning to conquer anything in sight. If the player hasn't won by this point, they're likely to struggle. One wizard slot is reserved for the Archmage to appear.
1.) Find the game folder on your PC: Master of Magic Caster Windows
2.) Dump the contents of the downloaded folder into it and overwrite 22 files to apply the included patches to V1.05.07.
3.) Load the MOD from the main screen. Type: More Stuff
4.) Restart
How to update:
1.) Dump the contents of the downloaded folder into the game folder on your PC: Master of Magic Caster Windows and overwrite.
2.) Unload the MOD from the main screen.
3.) Restart
4.) Load the MOD from the main screen. Type: More Stuff
5.) Restart
