Death Realm balance

[Nelphine]

Fair enough, I can accept that.

[Bahgtru]

Werewolves are living, so removing it from there is okay. However, is would be a major nerf to the unit so we can only do that if further testing shows they are still overpowered.

I thought that your game where you steamrolled with the werewolves without using your race at all was proof enough... 

Why don't you re-raise their resistance and remove all the immunities? That's going to make a lot more sense than leaving only some, as they're alive. And it'd be fun to get undead werewolves! 

Zombies who cares tbh, but if you nerf them you might want to reduce a bit (1-2 mana eh) their cost.

[Hadriex]

I'm very happy with death magic. It's such a massive improvement over the original game. I would not want to see their immunities or ability to make free units removed, as those are what makes the school distinct. Honestly it is the most on theme of all the schools of magic.



If you feel their early game is too strong, you might take ghouls ranged attack away, and increase their stats slightly. It's always seemed strange to me for them to be a ranged unit.

Death definitely needs a spell that hurts the undead, I mean, how can a necromancer, the person who knows the most about the undead, not have a plan to deal wit them? It would be simplest to rebrand an existing spell like reaper slash as another damage type for this. Wrack would also be a good candidate, wiping out armies.

Cold is an underutilized element in general. Honestly it might be worth considering removing that damage type entirely to make room for something new. Nature seems like it should be dealing poison damage if anything.

Why do naga deal poison damage? Sorcery has no business dealing in poison. That's nature and death's thing. Give naga something else entirely.

On the subject of the combat spells that grant spell casting power. I don't think I'd would miss them if they were removed. Seriously. Death is overflowing with hostile combat spells for killing units. What they lack is in buffs.

[Seravy]

A new damage type is an interesting idea.

I can see Fairy Dust dealing Poison Damage, although Ice Bolt, not so much. A bolt of poison would be weird for Nature. At best it could deal neutral damage but then it becomes effective against Death units (and it's the one thing we don't want to be effective).

Removing Cold, we could have Astral damage and immunity. I can see Reaper Slash, Wrack and Wave of Despair dealing this type of damage, and Death creatures would have no need to be immune to it, except maybe ghost types. Inner Fire granting this instead of Cold Immunity makes sense too.

However we might not need to remove cold. Immunity flags is a word value, but only the first 9 bits are used. Of course the remaining bits are already used for effects other than immunities, but the one right after weapon immunity has this description :
2  No effect (note 5)
Note 5: This bit is set for all flying units, but clearing it has no apparent effect on the unit.

So we can use this one. The only remaining problem will be displaying an icon for the ability.

[Seravy]

Assuming we do add Astral damage type and immunity...

Reaper Slash, Wrack and Wave of Despair would do astral damage. I don't think there is any other spell in the game where the type would be suitable.

Ghosts - Wraiths, Death Knights, Shadow Demons, Magic Spirit and Guardian Spirit would be immune to Astral. Probably Demon Lords as well. Other Death units won't. 
...that's the exact opposite of what common sense would dictate. Ghosts have a soul, undead do not. So astral should work on ghosts but not on things like zombies.
So Astral damage is not an appropriate name for the type. I'd expect "death" damage from those spell names but that covers the entire realm not a damage type so it's taken.
Anyway, we'll need a good name that has a common them with the listed 3 spells and makes sense to affect lesser Death creatures but not higher end ones. Or not. Again not that simple, we do want Wrack to work on Shadow Demons and Wraiths, but we don't want the other two to do the same. So a shared damage type is not even a solution. It isn't really worth adding a new type for only 2 spells (especially if one of them reduces the use of the Cold element).

Oh, well, it was a nice idea anyway.

[Seravy]

Wrack : found no mention of the damage being irrecoverable. Maybe it's my imagination I was against that. I guess we can try it.

[Hadriex]

Well if you went with astral damage that might include the life spell that deal damage. Possibly some units such as angels and shadow demons would deal in it. Then there are shamen and priests. Possibly paladins, golemns, and priests would be resistant to it, as well as a few summoned creatures.


Alternatively, If you wanted to go a completely different direction with this. Astral damage could be limited not to spells, but to artifacts and a rare few normal units, then make it super-effective against fantastic creatures. Allowing the creation of 'monster slayer' units. Or a 'monster slayer' buff.

While we see tons of immunities, we don't often see weaknesses. Could be an interesting angle to consider.



Replacing ice bolt with a poison spell isn't so hard, if you give it a different animation (such as the animation of the petrify spell) and a new name.


If you don't go with that, I was thinking about it, and a single 'hellfire' spell in death, that just deals fire damage, could help a lot. Particularly you added to all undead units a vulnerability to fire. This wouldn't apply to the death summons (well, maybe zombies). just units that are turned undead.

[Seravy]

Immunities are the weaknesses, for the enemy who deals that type of damage.
Monster Slayer is not a very good idea for this game, as summoned creatures are supposed to be superior to normal units. The two realms that are meant to counter the summons already does so, in a more balanced way. (Banish, Great Unsummoning, Holy Word, Exorcise)

I will consider adding Hellfire to replace Drain Power if the current changes prove insufficient. Fire is also somewhat underused. However that would result in 3 different direct damage spells in Death Uncommon, which feels quite excessive, and fire is really more of a Chaos thing.

For now I hope the change to Weakness, Wrack, and removal of some poison immunity which makes Reaper Slash work will be enough.

[Seravy]

I made Weakness work on all types of ranged attacks, as it's not an effective counter to ghouls and shadow demons otherwise. It also makes no sense it excludes magical ranged units when shatter includes them.
Breath is still excluded though.