Caster of Magic II Spell System overhaul discussion

[Seravy]

Phoneix can work, good idea!
Although then it likely should have Regeneration and Fire Immunity as well. The latter isn't a problem but Regeneration might be too good? Or is it? Life can heal and regenerate units with Supreme Light anyway.
This would need to be single figure so probably something like

Phoenix
Cost 450 MP
1 figure
20 attack, +2 to hit
32 hp
6 Defense
10 resistance
Death Immunity
Fire Immunity
Regeneration 2
Raise Dead Spell x3
Healing warmth :  At the beginning of each combat turn, heal up to 10 total damage among your normal units distributed randomly.
5 or 6 moves, flying.

All right, so which do we want, the Alicorns, or the Phoenix?
Are we happy with the effect? (healing normal units per turn)

If yes, that only leaves the Life Rare spell slot to fill and we're done with creating new spells, all that's left afterwards is deciding on the smaller details. (assuming we are ok with Mislead in Death uncommon, otherwise we need a Death spell as well.)

Oh and for the rare slot, there are other possibilities as well :
We can move Consecration down to rare.
-with more players in the game, protection from harmful city spells is more important.
-however, this does make chaos/death city curses somewhat less playable (probably of the enemy having Consecration on their cities increases by a little)
-It also makes it possible to protect the cities from the curses even before the enemy can research them.
...overall I think this might be a bad idea.
Moving Holy Arms to rare.
-This has been discussed previously, but I'm not convinced Holy Arms really is as weak as it looks like. It's a +25% bonus to damage output effectively, although if considering Prayer that does drop down to 20%.
-Although Blazing March (+3 attack) is typically more than 20% damage output and it is also rare, so maybe it's fine to do that.

If we move either to rare then we gain a very rare slot to fill instead.

[roarmalf]

Life Very Rare
Cost 450 MP
Alicorns
4 Figures
Flying, 4 moves. (Teleporting? Probably too OP on a healer...although at speed 4 and with flying, nothing will really attack it anyway at melee so why not.)
8 hp per figure, 8 armor, 10 attack, +3 to hit.
Raise Dead Spell x3.
Horn of Light : At the beginning of each combat turn, heal up to 10 total damage among your normal units distributed randomly.

Possibly also move Caster 40 from the Archangel to this unit - spellcasting might be one reason why Archangels are so much better than they should be based on their stats, as each one of them can cast a rare Life spell. Doesn't seem like a big deal but being able to cast Invulnerability plus Prayer without using up your opportunity to also cast Healing makes the unit pretty much unkillable. Or simply reduce the Caster 40 to a more fair amount (29 perhaps? Normal Angels are 24 I think so that's still higher but isn't enough to use any of the rare buffs or rare tier healing, and still only casts one normal healing spell.)

First of all I like upgraded unicorns, although I think I would change figures from 4 to differentiate easily. Majestic Auricorn even fits the flavor, minus the flying.

If you don't like the Unicorn flavor then these could work with multiple figures and flying would fit:

• Spirits fit as a hard to kill mobile unit that doesn't do a lot of damage, but can affect transportation to the afterlife. Would need non-corporeal flavor wise.
  
• A troop of "Ascendants" clerics/priests that have ascended to direct service of Life. Glowing eyes, possibly wings, flowing robes. This would fit well with 4 figures.
  

I would not include teleportation as it gives possibly too much power in city fights against magicians (of which there are many) along with more annoying issues of running that could come up in monster fights.

I'm wondering if the unit is too powerful with the free healing, which is a good sign, since it's a very rare. If we went with the "Ascendants" route it could be a special spell that converts a unit instead of summoning a creature. That adds some flexibility in where you summon the creature at the expense of costing a unit, so I think it's fine either way.

I do like taking away some of the Archagel's casting (28/29 feels right). It's already a formidable fighter, buffs the team naturally, and adding a free casting of Prayer is a lot, especially with it producing power.

Would Horn of Light stack if there are multiple units in the battle? I could see that getting out of hand in some army compositions (Mammoths and Hammerhands come to mind), although it might not be an issue since you would likely want to spread out your super healers.

My biggest concern is that they'll be too weak as wild monsters (but I guess we can just give a relatively low value to them).

Also, they either need to be Supernatural or have extremely high resistance to avoid warp creature + life drain.

[roarmalf]

Phoenix is great flavor wise. I would be very hesitant to give anything 6 move since it warps turn 1 of battles. I think it would be easier to differentiate it artistically than the Allicorns, but I like both.

[Seravy]

Alicorns :
Yes, unfortunately these will be weak creatures in lairs although still quite different from Unicorns in that they fly so Spiders don't work against them. They'd need to have a low lair value, probably only slightly higher than Chimeras.
The AI likely needs to special-case this unit and pretend it's a walking creature on the overland map, to prevent building up 9 stacks of them without other units. Even then, if there are enough of them on a continent available, they might build up into larger groups which is useless as wastes the creature.

Phoenix :
These basically introduce two more mechanics to the unit, Regeneration paired with semi-low magic resistance, and enough speed to hit enemies on turn 1.
Speed isn't useful for the normal unit support role (you don't want your healer to charge in and be in the front row) when used by the human player. However, it's useful for the AI who will inevitably end up with multiples of these in stacks or even 9 stacks of them. While much weaker than an Archangel, being able to hit on turn one, quickly dispatching all enemy units to offer no chance of stalling and forced retreat, paired with Regeneration makes this a viable creature for AI 9 stacks.

While I don't particularly like the idea to give Life a "regenerating 9 stack" creature which is Nature's specialiy, Supreme Light already does the same thing even better so that's not really a reason.
(Are we happy with Supreme Light as is btw? Regenerating magicians is fine, but regenerating Life creatures might be too good?)

Phoenix will be a dangerous enemy in lairs as it hits on first turn and regenerates and might even be worth more lair budget than the Archangels.

Regeneration also means it's a support unit that won't get "used up" in battles, needing to be resummoned every time, and killing the creature first to prevent the healing will not always be the correct tactic (although usually it will be).

both:
As it's a very rare creature, Supernatural will be added, yes.
I'm not sure if the ability should stack or not. On one side, if it stacks, healing for 20-30-50 can be really overpowered.
On the other hand, if the enemy doesn't focus their damage on a single unit and kills it, they would lose to the Mass Healing spell either way. (it heals 45 if all of your units were damaged) and this isn't much different functionally.
In general, if it's possible to deal enough damage that healing for 20-30 or more becomes relevant, then it's also enough damage to kill one unit or more.
Having too few normal units can also lead to the situation where you run out of units to heal, if the enemy managed to kill them - as units Raised from the Dead are unable to receive healing for the rest of the battle. So more than 2-3 of these Alicorns is not worth using anyway.

While, as explained above, the AI won't be using these in a smart way when building stacks to attack enemies, it's super effective for AI players on the defense, as they typically put 1-3 summoned creature per city into the garrisons.

Ascendants - we will have a different enchantment to turn a normal unit into a fantastic creature, so I rather not have this one.
Spirits - there are several other spirits in the game so that's already overused and we shouldn't be adding more of them. (Magic/Guardian Spirit, Wraiths)

[Seravy]

Trying to come up with more ideas for the last spell slot in Life.. maybe something about diplomacy?

High Council / Wizardry Union
You and all of your allies gain 10% of the average power income of the affected players.
You and all of your enemies lose 10% of the average power income of the affected players.
Both of these effects can only activate if there is at least one ally or enemy to share power with.

Alternately, same but using Research.
Now, this spell isn't good if you look at it from your personal viewpoint - you'll not gain more power than others, nor will the others lose more power than you.
However, if you look at the bigger picture :
-If you are much weaker than your allies, the "average power" will be a much greater relative increase for you than the others
-If you are stronger than your enemies, then the loss of "average power" for them will hurt much more the same realm.
-If you are in a fight with more than one enemy, all of them lose the amount but you only lose it once.
-While it does make your allies stronger, if those allies are actually helping you, that's useful.
-Making alliances with people much weaker than yourself can either help bringing them up closer to your level, or you can consider not allying with them because they lower the average.

I'm not sure how the AI should decide if they cast the spell or not though (and when they dispel it), we most likely don't want it to be biased and avoid the spell if the human player is an ally. It's also an economy spell, which we pretty much have enough of in the game, although this would be the only one that can improve the economy of players other than yourself.
Finally, another question is how should the spell stack with itself. If it does stack then more allies trading the spell between each other will result in a massive boost and pretty much guarantee someone from that group wins. If it does not then it's a wasted spell slot for everyone except the first person casting it.

Maybe this isn't a good idea, or would be better without the part about "enemy players".

Meditation
Overland Special Spell
Cost 250
Gain 1000 magic power during the turn after the spell has been cast

This is fairly straightforward. You invest casting skill to get more resources (SP/MP/RP) directly. Same functionality as using the Runemaster/Artificer combo in the original did - make mana out of casting skill.  Numbers are just examples, we'll probably need to do some math to make it fair.
As it's a reusable special spell, being a Spellweaver makes it quite a bit more powerful, offering a 33% discount. Allocating the power on research can accelerate into Spell of Mastery at the cost of giving up on summoning creatures or buffing units to defend yourself during the final war.
A potential problem might be the AI which effectively gets a double bonus on this - both the casting modifier and the power income modifier would apply, making it roughly 3 times more cost effective than for human players on high difficulty.
It's also questionable how useful this effect is in the very rare tier - probably not at all, as MP is already abundant, more casting skill is not worth investing into (the game doesn't last long enough to use it for enough time to get back the invested 250) and RP can be potentially gamebreaking (It's easily +2k RP each turn for Spell of Mastery) while the casting skill spent is by far the most valuable resource. (would you sell an Archangel for 2000 mana crystals? That's what this really is about.)

[Seravy]

If we can't come up with a "special spell" category spell for Life Very Rare, we could upgrade our rare "Divine Favor" idea for the tier like this :
Divine Favor
Cost 60/300
Unit Enchantment
Enchanted normal unit has 100% chance to hit and 60% chance To Defend.

Which leaves Death, but I think Mislead is a good spell to add however, I also think Mana Leak should be uncommon.
That means Mislead needs to be common.
While the effect of Mislead is fair for a common spell (it's basically a -1/-1 for enemy normal units so it's not much better than Darkness or Blur considering you also have to succeed on save roll to apply it), I'm not sure we want a spell like this in common.
On one side it does give a taste of what's to come by giving a less harsh punishment for using normal units than Blood Lust or Possession, but on the other side, it's common which means wizards with only 1 Death book will have access to it, and it's also available in the early game.
Now one can argue that in the early game there actually aren't that many normal units - it's the only part of the game where casting capacity exceeds the production capacity of players - so it's not really relevant, but on the other hand it can also be said that this spell hoses a strategy that's already underused (relying on producing early units instead of summoning creatures).
But even that isn't unsolvable - if we put the spell low on the AI research priority list, which we should anyway because early large normal unit armies aren't frequent enough - then it won't really appear much earlier than the first uncommon.
On the other hand the spell will be a powerful tool in the hand of the human player to break neutral towns which is probably needed to make up for losing Mana Leak in the early game which would be the answer to the neutral towns packed full of shaman and priests otherwise.

[Seravy]

So, while still leaving the possibility of replacing some of the new spell ideas if we have something better, this is how the spell table looks like at the moment, with every slot finally filled :
   

We still need to work out the details on the new spells, I'll try to summarize that in the next post.

[Seravy]

Already added
-Summon Demon will not summon Death Demons anymore.
-Demons summoned by a Demon Lord don't have Caster.

DECIDED
A. Earth To Mud will change back to create Mud tiles
B. Splitting Gaea's Blessing. Abundance increases maximal population by 50%. Gaea's Blessing keeps all other effects.
C. Call the Wild
Nature Rare Global Enchantment
Any node not owned by the casting wizard has a 10% chance to generate a rampaging monster stack each turn. (of creatures of the node's realm)
Rampaging monsters will never target the caster's cities and will avoid their units.
Whenever you attack a Lair, Node, Tower, or other neutral monster stack, each monster has a 25% chance of not participating in the battle. (they are forced to retreat if you win, but stay in the area if you lose.)
D. Clairvoyance
Nature Very Rare Global Enchantment
The casting wizard sees all tiles on the overland map.
The wizard is immune to the countering effect of nodes.
E. Planetary Mastery(very rare)
Nature Very Rare Global Enchantment
Whenever you cast an expensive spell, an earthquake hits a target city.
All nodes under the casting wizard's control produce an additional 15 power.
F. Split Dispelling Wave
G. Vertigo becomes -25% To Hit, -7% To Defend.
H. Split Uranus's Blessing. Philosopher's Stone receives the effect of magic weapon granting and Counter Magic in battle.
I. Wind Mastery
Sorcery Very Rare Global Enchantment
All of your units gain flight and +1 movement.
J. Fire Elemental cost to 14.
K. Immolation gains Cold Immunity
L. Insulation
Chaos Uncommon.
Enchanted unit has Fire Immunity and Lightning Resistance.
M. Swap the resistance of Efreet and Doom Bat
N. Chain Lightning
Chaos Combat Very Rare
Target unit and the two nearest enemy units are hit by a strength 45 Lightning Bolt spell. The effect will not affect the same unit more than once and will avoid targeting units immune to magic.
O. Blazing Eyes
Chaos Overland Very Rare
All Chaos creatures gain Doom Gaze 3.
P. Discipline
Life common unit enchantment
Cost 8/40 MP, Upkeep 1
Target : Base type Normal unit only.
Enchanted unit gains +1 defense.
If enchanted unit is at least Regular, it gains another +1 defense.
If enchanted unit is at least Veteran, it gains +1 attack.
If enchanted unit is at least Elite and this enchantment wasn't cast it in combat, it gains +1 movement.
Q. Endurance
Life Uncommon
Cost 60 MP, upkeep 2
Enchanted unit gains +1 movement.
Enchanted unit gains +4 hit points divided evenly between all figures, rounded down, but a minimum of 1 per figure.
R. Arch Angel becomes Caster 29.
S. Divine Favor
Life Very Rare Unit Enchantment
Cost 60/300
Unit Enchantment
Enchanted normal unit has 100% chance to hit and 60% chance To Defend.
T. Phoenix
Life Very Rare Creature
Cost 450 MP
1 figure, 20 attack, +2 to hit, 32 hp, 6 Defense, 10 resistance, 5 movement, flying
Death Immunity, Fire Immunity, Regeneration 2,
Raise Dead Spell x3
Healing warmth :  At the beginning of each combat turn, heal up to 10 total damage among your normal units distributed randomly.
U. Destiny
Life Very Rare Overland unit enchantment
400 mana
Enchanted nonhero normal unit gains Supernatural and is a Life creature. This changes the unit's base unit type.
Enchanted unit has doubled base melee attack, ranged attack, hit points and gains +4 defense and resistance.
V. Mislead
Death Common Combat instant, Cost 20
Target normal unit must resist, or gains Misfortune. All other normal units fighting in the same army as that unit lose 1 attack, defense and resistance (not cumulative and can't be dispelled). The target suffers a -1 save penalty when attempting to resist this spell for each two fantastic units on your side.
W. Reinforce Magic
Sorcery Rare Global Enchantment
All of your units gain +2 resistance.
All of your units gain +2 magical ranged attack strength, if they have a magical ranged attack.
X. Vampire
Death Rare creature
395 MP
1 figure, 20 attack, +2 To Hit,  12 defense, 25 hit points, 5 Resistance.
Death, Cold, Poison, Illusion, Weapon Immunity, Regeneration 2. Flying.
Vampirism - Whenever this unit deals any damage to a unit, it deals an additional 4 damage and is healed for 4.
Y. Darkest Hour
Death Very Rare Global Enchantment
All religious and research buildings produce halved power and research except your own.
Z. Mourning
Death Very Rare Global Enchantment
Every 4th turn after this enchantment was cast, the highest cost unit of each player dies irrecoverably. If that unit is a hero, it can save at -5 to avoid this effect, and pass it on to the next highest cost unit.
AA. Eternal Night loses "halved power" effect, and gains "The Darkness enchantment has doubled effect."


UNDECIDED
1. How many rare and very rare spells and possibly guaranteed spells should books 7-10 contain? I assume there is no need to change books before the 7th. Do we want 10 books = all spells, or do we want 10 books = not all spells but more guaranteed than before?
2. Name for the "make forests" Nature spell.
3. Name for Dispelling City spell.
4. Should "Dispelling City" work in combat, or overland only?
5. How do we improve Wind Walking?
6. Do we want to reduce Magic Vortex damage?
7. Fire Mastery. We need to design exactly how much and what kind of buffs it gives to fire attacks, and/or fire monsters, and need a casting cost, etc.
8. Arch Angel, keep the Wind Walking or remove? (we are planning to buff the ability. Also the Phoenix will not have it and it makes no sense that only one of the two support creatures have the ability.)
9. Destiny, do we want it do be possible to dispel, or not? I'm leaning towards "not".
10. Divine Favor - base normal unit or current? In other words, can this buff the Paladins summoned by Call To Arms? If yes, that might be way too powerful by giving Life too much ability to create an army from thin air - having a good combat summon is already a lot.


We might need someone to
Make the Vampire and Phoenix unit
Make the global enchantment graphics for the new spells that can't reuse existing ones. (Clairvoyance can use Awareness and Wind Mastery can use the original spell of the same name.)
Any volunteers?
While I can probably do some of these, the larger images (overland summoning animation and global enchantments) might be a bit difficult. Phoenix sounds hard too, maybe by editing Cockatrices?
I can most likely take care of the smaller things like unit enchantment icons myself without any difficulty.

[zitro1987]

Book 01 : 3/1/0/0, 0/0/0/0, Find/Trade common
Book 02 : 3/2/1/0, 1/0/0/0, Find/Trade Uncommon
Book 03 : 4/3/2/1, 2/0/0/0, Find/Trade Rare
Book 04 : 5/3/3/3, 3/0/0/0, Find/Trade Very Rare
Book 05 : 6/4/4/4, 4/1/0/0,
Book 06 : 7/5/5/5, 5/1/0/1,

Book 07 old : 10/6/6/6, 5/2/0/1
Book 07 old : 10/7/6/6, 5/2/0/1 (+1 uncommon)

Book 08 old : 10/10/7/6, 5/0/2/1,
Book 08 new : 10/10/7/7, 5/0/2/1, (+1 v rare)

Book 09 old : 10/10/10/7, 5/0/2/0, +8% research, -5% casting cost
Book 09 new: 10/10/9/9 , 5/0/2/2, (-1 rare but +2 v rare, 2 guaranteed rares)

Book 10 old : 10/10/10/10 , 5/0/2/0, +16% research, -10% casting cost

Book 10+ I have 2 proposals

Preferred Idea 1
Book 10 : 10/10/12/10 , 5/0/2/0, +15% research, -5% cost (all rares, not all v rares) - must obtain remaining 2 via treasure, 11th book, trading, conquest
Book 11 : 10/10/12/12 , 5/0/2/0, +30% research, -10% cost (all v rares)

Alternate Idea 2:
Book 10: 10/10/12/12 , 5/0/2/0, (all rares and v rares)
Book 11: +20% research, -10% casting cost

Given that there is a higher denominator for rares and very rares, the update to have up to 12 rares and very rares nerfs dual-color or multi-color wizards. To compensate, the bonuses to research and spell casting cost are moved to book 10 or even 11, depending on whether we choose to provide all v rares at book 10 or 11.

Given the bonuses start later and having more expensive spells, I recommend focusing on a major research boost as opposed to a spell cost reduction.

Books 8 and 9 keep it consistent with having the same # of rares and very rares. Book #9 allows 2 guaranteed rares because it lost a rare.

[Cruel100]

What was the modification of the Phantom Beast?