Master of Magic 2 Wishlist For Slitherine

[Seravy]

Interesting but that would devalue damage over time effects and all combat global enchantments. You have to cast Prayer each battle but If that battle now lasts 3 "battles" then it costs 3 times more. Of course if it carries over then it's great but that opens a new can of worms, the "let's keep that last enemy spearmen alive as long as possible so all the combat globals stay in effect for the upcoming battles once their next army arrives to attack".
It'll also devalue normal troops and anything that's not a doomstack, as starting a new "instance" of battle gives players new casting skill so now that weaker army that takes 15 turns to conquer the city has to face enemy spells twice instead of once on top of losing an overland turn.
Then fleeing needs to be changed because if the combat will restart, you need a way to have 100% chance to escape with your units that didn't get hurt between the two combats.
Damage done to city tiles by standing on them has to be different too and then there is the problem with combat summons - it's trivial to spend 10 turns summoning a new unit so the enemy never conquers the city and this can keep going the next battle.
Of course ranged units get more powerful too - The turns when they'd be out of arrows and the enemy is already close and can attack them mostly disappear so it's easier to keep them alive.
This is a good idea but needs a complete overhaul of several core game mechanics to make it work and it's so very different that I'd no longer consider it a Master of Magic sequel but a completely different new game. A game I'd like to play, but a different game nonetheless.

[Blake00]

Forgot to say that as well as posting other peoples wish lists & suggestions I of course also gave them a copy of my own personal wish list below:

• BIG ONE - More than 4 enemy players. Implode's MoM HD Multiplayer Remake allowed EVERY wizard in one game for super 14 player games which would have bee EPIC and so much fun had he finished the project.
• Larger maps (Insectiside fan patch added huge map size to the original)
• Limited Spying (most fantasy rpgs have thieves/rogues so it fits and stealing spells would be fun)
• Time limit and bigger cost on time stop spell (if you're planning on having that annoying spell again)
• Demand or give cities in Diplomacy (most 4x games have this now and I like using it to play god/peacekeep and save bullied Civs and minor factions from deaths door)
• Expand Grey Neutral Faction into lots of minor factions with identities and race affiliations (eg a minor Elven race with a minor elf wizard that likes Elven main civs and makes trouble for others.. this is another thing done in modern 4x fantasy and space games)
• More worlds and/or an underground world (although this has already been done before in AoW, HoMM & Warlock series)
• More ocean content eg HoMM series filled oceans with shipwreck lairs and treasures (even Morrowind had underwater caves filled with creatures and treasure so this is not new to fantasy games). You could even have a Merfolk faction with cities in the ocean. The fun Fantasy and Midgard scenarios for Civilization 2 Test of Time had a good underwater Merfolk faction with lots of sea based units/creatures.
• Not essential but some cool weather effects would be a fun immersion factor (especially as you can tie spells into them for gameplay events such as huge storms and earthquakes etc). The Official Playstation remake of Master of Magic has clouds rolling over and some cool weather effects from spells. The new Civ6 addon Gathering Storm is another good example of world changing weather effects.
• Talk to Seravy, he's da man on all things MoM and the creator of the super popular MoM overhaul mod Caster of Magic (which we now know they've already done haha)

[Arnuz]

The most important resource being time, it would be great if tactical combat wasn't close ended - 25/50 rounds then retreat - but could instead play over several turns, continuing on the next day where troops finished in the previous.

Then each combat could be shortened, perhaps to 10 rounds, so that late game becomes less boring.

Units designed to last long such as gargoyles would then be able to occupy stronger units for more turns then worth. A totally new dimension of opportunity cost would arise!

A further thought in this direction. Not only would this defeat the frustrating and annoying wait 50 turns necessity, this would also allow troops to join in a combat as reinforcements.

Combats could last many turns, until none of the initial troops are there anymore but the same battle wages on! Mediaeval style multi year long sieges? In fantasy? Rock on!

Ammo and mana could be replenished on each turn - no issue, ranged troops are the first ones to go anyway. Battle globals should be checked for balance, that's bound to happen anyway.

The game designers could even play with a hard mode where troops have morale and foraging needs, but that'd be better left as optional to avoid too drastic a change.

[tehemperorer]

I understand this game isn't a good fit for modern multiplayer concepts, but I think a chess-style multiplayer, 2 person maximum would be worth it. This would require saving game states, but Conan Unconquered, while not a triple A title, does this simply and I enjoy playing it with friends. I am a software engineer; I understand programming and the difficulties that come with it so I'm not blithely throwing "let's have multiplayer" out there but I really do think that having the ability to play the game with 1 other person is doable. I play CoM a lot and I have to sit through AI turns that take a while, but that's the game - there are no complaints here. Waiting for my brother or friend to take their turn isn't an issue; come to think of it, in Conan Unconquered the other player can pause the game whenever they like, and it's an RTS.

In Conan Unconquered, the only multiplayer game saved is the last one you've played. I think a lot of people agree they don't want to play a 30 hour game in a single stretch with a random opponent that will grief you once they start to lose, but freeing up a slot for another human player via direct connection naturally mitigates this problem: that human is someone you know more often than not, or at least a like-minded individual you found on a forum or discord channel.

All this being said my request for multiplayer is that it is simple so as to avoid taxing the development resources, involves 1 other person, the session can be saved and resumed later.

EDIT: I'm enjoying the **** out of caster of magic, I think CoM is a wonderful strategic game with great decision making (a commodity in short-supply these days). I of course played MoM when I was younger and it was on floppy disks

[DrPraetor]

* It would be nice to jettison the racist tropes inherited from D&D and Tolkien?  This stuff was 100% cringe back in the 90s and it's only worse now.
 I'm not saying you have to be super-woke - by all means, there can be hot elf chicks who look like Storm - but having Arabs and Englishmen as different "races" ala Elves and Trolls is not a good look.
 Some system of polities or mixable combo of race and culture would be a big improvement.  So you could have a "Central" culture that was coded as Arab or Persian, and they could have Dwarves or Halflings or Lizardmen in their cities.  Lizardmen in a Central city could do different things than Lizardmen in a Northern city ( maybe not as bonkers as this - https://illwiki.com/dom5/ind-ma ).
 Also you should avoid wizards that are clearly from cultures/polities not represented in the game - so if you don't want to ship with Mayas/Aztecs, hold Tlaloc off for the DLC.
(Note: in order to avoid kidnapping the thread, people disagreeing might open another thread to do so?  Having made the request I don't personally feel much need to debate it, except in implementation.)

*  I've always wanted navigable rivers and brown-water navies.  You guys write wargames, you know how important rivers were for military mobility in the medieval period.

*  I'd like to have diplomatic relations with otherwordly forces; so the Lords of Light can call you and demand stuff - you can negotiate with the Hidden Powers (Sorcery) to get sorcery nodes to stop sending raiders at you, or to get the Hidden Powers to accept your binding of some of their nodes, or whatever.  Maybe you need to build a religious building of the appropriate type / conquer a corresponding node to establish contact (but they can still have a hidden relation and hate you even if you never converse.)

* If you really want to get bonkers, it would be awesome to design summons and things out of swappable elements during-play.  This would be insanely difficult to code up, let alone balance, but if you researched the element "petrification", you could use it either to create a flesh-to-stone combat spell, or a flesh-to-stone overland blast, or add stoning gaze to a summoned creature, or whatever context-specific effect the spell element would have as a city enchantment or buff or etc.

[zitro1987]

Combat - General Ideas (borrowing a bit from Age of Wonders, but keeping it Master of Magic - speedy, somewhat tactical) 

Assume most is similar to caster of magic, including 2mv basic units, except the following:

Movement and Action Points 
*A melee unit can hit a maximum of 3 times
   -maximum 3 melee hits can only happen when you have 2mv left (example: a stationary 2mv swordsman, a faster unit initiating attack at 2mv left)
   -if melee unit has 1mv left, it can only hit 2 times.
   -if melee unit has 0mv left when reaching enemy unit, it is allowed to hit, but only once 
*A ranged unit can use standard ranged attacks a maximum of 2 times. 
   -It can shoot twice when it has 2mv left (example: a stationary 2mv bowman, a horsebowman initiating attack at 2mv left)
   -A ranged unit can shoot once when it has 1mv left
   -A ranged unit cannot shoot or act when it has 0mv left (except melee once, see above)
   -A ranged unit cannot shoot if engaged with an adjacent melee attacker. Moving back will solve it, but a typical bowman will only get to shoot once this way.
   -# of ammo is about 75-100% higher due to maximum 2 shots
*Special abilities, spells, or special ranged attacks (e.g. stone giant throwing a giant boulder, a dragon doing an area of effect attack) can be triggered if unit has at least 1mv left (same as master of magic). 
*all units have a 'defense command' if unit has at least 1mv left. Unit gains 2-3 armor in addition to 25% resistance to melee, but can't counterattack (useful to try to survive nearby attacks, an archer waiting for backup, etc)

Changed Abilities and Mechanisms
*A typical physical or ranged attacker deals 100% damage if 2-3 tiles away, 75% 4 tiles away, 50% 5 tiles away, 25% 6 tiles away. 
  -This calculation is applied after damage and shield rolls to allow weaker damage to possibly pass through. If result is fraction of 1, then it becomes a possibility of 1dmg (if result is .4, then 40% chance of 1dmg)
  -'no range penalty' does away with these % reductions, dealing maximum damage up to 6 tiles away, but can't shoot farther than that.
  -'long range' or being in city walls adds +2 to the tile limits (100% if 2-5 tiles away, 75% if 6 tiles away, etc)
  -forces units to try to engage and makes battle more tactical
*First Strike 
  -an first striker applies 1st hit always, then both sides attack 2nd round ... 
  -A separate ability for first counterattacks, always applying that first hit when defending (a counterattack first strike could be for a halberdier)
  -the one without first strike would have an extra attack at the end so each side hits same # of times if both survive.
  -Example: cavalry hits golem, then both golem and cavalry hit, then both golem and cavalry hit, then golem (if survives) hits the 3rd time
  -Example: cavalry with 1mv left hits golem, then both golem and cavalry hit, then golem (i survives) hits a 2nd time.
*Suppression
  -A 4th counterattack by same unit has 25% penalty, a 5th a 50% penalty, a 6th a 75% penalty, and will not counterattack anymore after a 7th (ability: unlimited retaliation negates these limitations)
*Flying:
  -ranged attacks from ground units have to shoot 1 tile closer in regards to range penalties and ability to shoot
  -Ground units when instructed to attack flying unit via melee, has a 50% chance of action point wasted with no effect due to flying unit dodge (no attack, no counterattack)
  -Flying unit, if utilizing 'defend' command (see above) is immune from ground melee, meaning ground units are forbidden to engage.
  -Certain units have a 'anti-flyer' ability that ignores all 3 benefits above. Probably halberdier/Pikemen again
  -Flying units can bypass city walls of course
*Split Armor into 'physical armor' and 'elemental armor' ... still keep resistance
  -Most units will have similar values for both, most armor boosting spells will do the same ... but
  -Some units may have better elemental armor than physical (let's say cavalry, sprites)
  -while some units may have better physical armor than elemental (let's say stone giant)
  -some spells will focus on just elemental armor (we already have these: resist elements, elemental armor)
*Split magical attack into multiple elemental categories: cold, fire, lightning, spirit? sorcery?
*City defense being overhauled, as it is rather crude and underworked in master of magic
  -all walls and 'gate' can be damaged by melee units (and boulders)
  -but damage is generally static regardless of unit strength .. say 10dmg + whatever unit deals to a 5armor entity.
  -gate has the least hp, but is a bit inwards and be reached by a single unit at a time.
  -defender units across walls can still attack, melee and ranged, while having that +3 armor bonus, chipping away at those poor losers trying to destroy a wall or go through the weaker gate.
-ranged attacks have 2 tiles more range
  -let's assume gate has 20hp (up to 2 hits) and walls have 60hp (up to 6 hits)
*Charge
  -Add Age of Wonder's Charge ability for certain units, dealing extra damage after moving a few tiles.

Put an end to stalling The stalling tactic, including by neutral guardians, has got to stop. Games don't have such a mechanic, and it causes frustration to a lot of players
*after 25 turns, whoever remains in battle goes through the auto-battle algorithm (with their current status, hp left) to declare a winner.
*Units such as ranged flyers have an advantage still because they would have caused initial damage prior to auto-battle.


Don't follow Age of Wonders too closely. The following mechanics would likely break master of magic, even if they generally work very well in age of wonders 3
*1-figure system (game relies on figure # variability)
*Flanking (will slow down gameplay with working to ensure units face the right direction, etc ... also too different)
*ranged obstructed view penalty (not necessary)
*flanked attacks when unit moves around an enemy unit or archer escapes when engaged (not necessary)
*1 spell per turn even if multiple hero casters (please no, works for age of wonders, but not here)
*everyone attacking first (we have first strike for a reason)
*defense command when 0mv left (too abusable)
*Running out of counterattacks after 3 then having 0mv afterwards (too much of a nerf against top units)
*adding lots of tiles, units moving numerous tiles per turn (please no)
*having multi-armies engage at same time like 5 armies of 6 = 30 units in battle (battles too long)
*many others

[zitro1987]

I think a lot of the notes i made above of damage reduction (with defend, with ranged attacks too far, etc) should be tied to ‘to-hit’ and ‘to defend’ and both being redesigned from just a multiplicative factor of damage to something more chance based:

Each attack could go one of 4 ways: miss, fumble, hit, critical hit

When to hit vs enemy to defend match, unit has 80% hit, 10% fumble, 10% critical

When to hit is lower, theres more % to fumble and to even miss entirely. When to hit is greater, unit will never fumble and do criticals more often

Fumble can mean 67% of damage before shields
To hit can mean 150 of damage before shields