"how to mod" questions

[Asfex]

For a purpose of well-balanced gameplay, it seems to me that multi-target spells shouldn't be affected by -Save from items.
It's not that hard to reach -8 Save on a hero, and then a single Death spell would destroy a whole 9 units army...

As i see in the code, the best way to disable the -save from items is to make this work for each spell separately.
however, call chaos, death spell and holy word are located in the one procedure. But i need a full list of spells to fix this.
Is this enough?

[Asfex]

1) Does anyone know how to mod the productivity of different squares? Specifically, I would like to mod coastal squares to produce
2) Does anyone know hot to mod the mechanics of the Change Terrain spell? As in - which squares are valid targets and what it produces in those squares?

The change terrain spell look for terrain type( 0 -1f6 ) and change it. the method to select it is like logical construct :
if (a<x<b) or (c<x<d) or .... . This make it hard to modify, but its possible. I do not know a reason to force efforts to do this.

The productivity of the fields is like this. however there is present procedure of receiving name of the field, but it is not used for production of the terrain types.

[mhek]

Is it possible to give fantastic creatures the ability to lower unrest in cities? In all of my games I focus on normal units due to the fact that only they can deal with unrest in cities, so even weak normal units remain useful also towards the endgame. I think giving fantastic creatures this ability would make the game more flexible + it might also help the AI as it often has fantastic creatures in its cities. So is it easily doable?

PS: I wanted to make a new thread for this but somehow I don't have the permissionto open one.

[Asfex]

try wizards.exe c264e 9a 73 ->23 72. now fantastic creatures will reduce unrest instead of heroes.

[mhek]

try wizards.exe c264e 9a 73 ->23 72. now fantastic creatures will reduce unrest instead of heroes.

Thanks, that sounds promising, even though heroes would not lower unrest then!

Just to be sure, since I've never used a hex editor: I need to search the line "c264e 9a 73" and change it to "c264e 23 72"?

Thanks again for looking this up! Very much appreciated


EDIT: Thanks, I just downloaded a hex-editor and managed to make your suggested change. It works after a quick test!!!

[zitro1987]

Myrran still does not bring much of an advantage, so:
*How can you modify Myrran so that the extra initial power it gives you more power (say +10 instead of +5)?
*Make node defenders in myrran plane equal in strength/numbers as in normal plane?

also:
*How can you modify SageMaster research bonus of 25%?
*How can you modify ArchMage skill bonus (halving the insane 50% or removing the fixed +10 or a bit of both)
*How can you change the Mana Focusing mana bonus (25% is feeble)

[letsdance]

tweaker can edit sagemaster research bonus. be careful, if someone can get a total research bonus over 100% it will probably cause troubles.

new findings in magic.exe:
33949 holds the extra pick cost for myrran (currently 2: 1+2=3) this seems pretty save to change.

the following are part of some calculations. changing them may cause troubles.
setting 3391c to e2 reduces the cost for famous to 1. changing it to ea also reduces the cost for infernal power to 1. i guess this is a bit sum, taking those picks out of the extra cost calculations. maybe one of the people who cracked the code can use this to find the full formula.
changing 33920 or 33931 or 33938 to (anything though some numbers cause crashes) reduces the cost for everything that costs 2 to 1. i guess here is a code that adds +1 to all costs for specified picks.
setting 338fb (from 0e) to 0d makes alchemy free without changing anything else

done for now...

[zitro1987]

tweaker can edit sagemaster research bonus. be careful, if someone can get a total research bonus over 100% it will probably cause troubles.

new findings in magic.exe:
33949 holds the extra pick cost for myrran (currently 2: 1+2=3) this seems pretty save to change.

the following are part of some calculations. changing them may cause troubles.
setting 3391c to e2 reduces the cost for famous to 1. changing it to ea also reduces the cost for infernal power to 1. i guess this is a bit sum, taking those picks out of the extra cost calculations. maybe one of the people who cracked the code can use this to find the full formula.
changing 33920 or 33931 or 33938 to (anything though some numbers cause crashes) reduces the cost for everything that costs 2 to 1. i guess here is a code that adds +1 to all costs for specified picks.
setting 338fb (from 0e) to 0d makes alchemy free without changing anything else

done for now...

Thanks, I'll go and try this!


new mod question requests for all: How to remove the unrest bonus of stationed units?
Is there a way to reduce number of lairs?
manipulation of lair/node/tower reward system, particularly spell research stuff? (why am I getting 'great drake' or 'call the void' after defeating night stalkers or gargoyles?)

[Anthony]

So...just was wondering about heroes. Did a little digging, they're stored right next to the normal units. It appears that melee of +1 per level is hardcoded (note: I just noticed that all my offsets are off by 4)
Hero Unit Bonuses
Level 2
8f8f4: increment Resistance(6)
8f905: increment Ranged(1)
8f91b: increment Defense(5)
level 3
8f927: increment To Hit(4)
8f92e: increment Resistance(6)
8f93f: increment Ranged(1)
level 4
8f95a: increment Resistance(6)
8f96b: increment Ranged(1)
8f981: increment Defense(5)
level 5
8f98d: increment Resistance(6)
8f99e: increment Ranged(1)
level 6
8f9b9: increment To Hit(4)
8f9c0: increment Resistance(6)
8f9d1: increment Ranged(1)
8f9e7: increment Defense(5)
level 7
8f9f3: increment Resistance(6)
8fa04: increment Ranged(1)
level 8
8fa1f: increment Resistance(6)
8fa30: increment Ranged(1)
8fa46: increment Defense(5)
level 9
8fa52: increment To Hit(4)
8fa59: increment Resistance(6)
8fa6a: increment Ranged(1)
Normal Unit Bonuses
level 2
8fa87: increment Resistance(6)
8fa98: increment Ranged(1)
level 3
8fab3: increment Resistance(6)
8faba: increment Defense(5)
level 4
8fac6: increment To Hit(4)
8facd: increment Resistance(6)
8fade: increment Ranged(1)
level 5
8faf9: increment To Hit(4)
8fb00: increment Resistance(6)
8fb07: increment Defense(5)
level 6
8fb13: increment To Hit(4)
8fb1a: increment Resistance(6)
8fb2b: increment Ranged(1)

[Zaldron]

As I anticipated in the Welcome! section, I'd like to write a mod called MESC (Make Every Spell Count). I summarized all your suggestions regarding MoM spells available in the forum, trying to balance all spells only altering their cost, upkeep, spell save and sometimes rarity but not their effects, I think it is the easiest way to balance the magic system without altering the spirit of the game. The collected wisdom derived from your game experience is suggesting of debuffing mainly Life Magic (and a bit Sorcery Magic) in favour of Death Magic, Nature Magic and Chaos Magic.

Of course I know that each player has his personal style of play and prefers to play with a certain magic system, nonetheless I hope you'll enjoy the new mod, since it will try to make more interesting the act of aquiring a new spell. One of the greatest Game Designer once told that the secret of a good 4X game is very simple: it should be a sequence of interesting choices. So, the aim is to make every spell the more interesting possible (beside very rare spells that arrives too late and are more the cherry on the cake). You already posted a lot of very interesting ideas and comments regarding the Magic system, and I hope you'll help me with your ancient Sorcerer's wisdom.

To be able to fully create this new mod, I need only a pair of indications about modding MoM I didn't find in the forum, in particular:

1) How is it possible to create a mod that will stand the test of time, to be fully compatible with future version of the Insecticide patch? (And hopefully also the Plight help mod)
2) Is it possible to change the rarity of a Spell? If yes, is there a full list of the memory address of every MoM spell?

I think that's all what I need to start modding, so any help from you will be greatly appreciated.