Caster of Magic II Spell System overhaul discussion

[Anskiy]

For what it's worth, massone, I've definitely got use out of Holy Word. I recall it being very effective against a Chaos wizard who had Doom Mastery active. As for Supreme Light, having a regenerating unit of magicians + some Angels actually makes them quite potent. My gripes still lie with a mono-Chaos start, and how it has many situational spells litter the book until you get to the uncommon tier. I think that at the very least Chaos should get more skill points to be able to fling more fire bolts around, being the direct damage magic school.

[Cruel100]

I realized Wind Mastery and King of the Underworld both suffer from a critical flaw.
Dispel them and all the units the owner had drowns in sea instantly.
Is there anything we can do about that?

Yes I liked! Muahhhahaha  I think that AI should have top priority to do this when available. You can always use boats to sail. At most it could have a chance of survival if you are close to the coast.

[Seravy]

I realized Wind Mastery and King of the Underworld both suffer from a critical flaw.
Dispel them and all the units the owner had drowns in sea instantly.
Is there anything we can do about that?

Yes I liked! Muahhhahaha  I think that AI should have top priority to do this when available. You can always use boats to sail.

That's not the problem. The AI can't avoid stepping on sea tiles if it's not necessary and will pathfind through the sea to do pretty much anything, leaving most of their units vulnerable to disjunction.
Unless we want to flag these two spells as "the AI never casts these", we have to do something about it.

Edit : For Underworld a possible solution is to only grant Wraith Form during battle. For Wind Mastery though, I'd hate to lose the overland effect from the spell.

[Cruel100]

I realized Wind Mastery and King of the Underworld both suffer from a critical flaw.
Dispel them and all the units the owner had drowns in sea instantly.
Is there anything we can do about that?

Yes I liked! Muahhhahaha  I think that AI should have top priority to do this when available. You can always use boats to sail.

That's not the problem. The AI can't avoid stepping on sea tiles if it's not necessary and will pathfind through the sea to do pretty much anything, leaving most of their units vulnerable to disjunction.
Unless we want to flag these two spells as "the AI never casts these", we have to do something about it.

Is it possible to make Wind Mastery and King of the Underworld immune to disjunction and make it susceptible to dispel magic directly?

[Seravy]

Is it possible to make Wind Mastery and King of the Underworld immune to disjunction and make it susceptible to dispel magic directly?

Well if they put a combat version of Flight and Wraith Form on the units when entering combat and only apply the effect directly outside then yes but only Dispelling Wave can reasonably do anything about an army like that and being forced to use it instead of other spells is halfway to losing the battle. (besides only Sorcery players have it anyway)

[Seravy]

Actually I do think making Ruler of Underworld apply Wraith Form only during battle would be better.
The two enchantments are too similar (and yes, it's a bit too late to realize that) and this can help there - it makes sense if the Death spell emphasizes the combat effect while the Sorcery one is less powerful in combat but offers overland mobility. (whether all flight is less powerful than the +8 armor vs all nonspell attacks is subjective though - I'd say it is unless the opponent has a multitarget counter to it and only Life and Sorcery get one each at rare - but we did put the Sorcery spell in a higher research bracket anyway so it's acceptable if it's better.)

[Cruel100]

Actually I do think making Ruler of Underworld apply Wraith Form only during battle would be better.
The two enchantments are too different (and yes, it's a bit too late to realize that) and this can help there - it makes sense if the Death spell emphasizes the combat effect while the Sorcery one is less powerful in combat but offers overland mobility. (whether all flight is less powerful than the +8 armor vs all nonspell attacks is subjective though - I'd say it is unless the opponent has a multitarget counter to it and only Life and Sorcery get one each at rare - but we did put the Sorcery spell in a higher research bracket anyway so it's acceptable if it's better.)

I agree.

[MilesBeyond]

For what it's worth, massone, I've definitely got use out of Holy Word. I recall it being very effective against a Chaos wizard who had Doom Mastery active. As for Supreme Light, having a regenerating unit of magicians + some Angels actually makes them quite potent. My gripes still lie with a mono-Chaos start, and how it has many situational spells litter the book until you get to the uncommon tier. I think that at the very least Chaos should get more skill points to be able to fling more fire bolts around, being the direct damage magic school.

Holy Word is also very potent against Death wizards - it forces them to worry more about actual garrisons for freshly-conquered cities, as anything raised by Wraiths/DKs/DLs/Zombie Mastery is probably going to be nuked by a single casting. While that's obviously an extremely niche use for the player it's a potent tool for the AI to have. Don't know if that necessarily makes it worthy of a Very Rare slot, though.

[Seravy]

Holy Word, I still remember when my Priestess hero used it to destroy 5 Demon Lords in the last enemy fortress because spell save items.

[MilesBeyond]

Yeah it definitely can do some major damage. It can be underwhelming if it's not in a situation that it's tailored for but also killing things is an off-colour effect for Life so it *should* be underwhelming in those situations IMHO. I personally think it's in a great spot right now of providing Life *some* sort of VR nuke that can be strong without being anything that you'd want to specifically take Life books hoping you'll get it (which, again, IMHO it shouldn't be. Because that's not Life's thing).