Spells: Light touch balancing for release

[WhiteMage]

By time delay I'm referring to the fact that it takes a good 10 seconds per turn to resolve Call Lightning. That's just a nuisance to me.

Oh, I see. I never noticed it, but I play on a Win98 without DosBox, so it maybe another example of the time delay due to DosBox I reported in the Bugs forum. Maybe the code can be made more efficient there to lower that delay. But wouldn’t even a simple fire bolt take 3 seconds? Is this animation related?

[robinh3123]

Chaos

Wall of fire: 1 upkeep (2)
How about making it zero upkeep or strengthening the spell effect?

Lightning Bolt: strength 8 (5) attack +1/mana
How about making Lightning Bolt a fixed damage spell? Distinguishes it better from fire bolt and fireball. Those can at least be protected from with fire immunity, little you can do against lightning bolt. Say, strength 15 armour piercing attack for 20 mana.

Doom bolt: 12 (10) damage
I'd like to keep Doom Bolt at 10 damage for sake of balancing Warlock units.

Armageddon: Casting cost 750 (1250)
Why? This one is a game breaker and it even earns you mana. How about an upkeep reduction instead so you can really profit from it once you get it off?

Armageddon is not a game breaker. It just raise some volcanos around cities owned by wizards other than the castor. BUT volcanos has 5% chance each turn to change into maintain. This both releive you from the no-procution volcano square, and reduce the mana income to the castor.
I did not see how many volcano it creates each turn. For example, suspose it creates 1 volcano per turn: After it creats 20 volcano, the next volcano is created with one volcano turned into mountain in average (20 * 5% = 1).
Not a big deal.

[Vagabond]

OK, I switched heroism to a cost increase. Also, I switched the costs of Stone Skin and Holy Armor since I switched their bonuses. Finally, I decreased the cost of Giant Strength. I didn't want to buff it since then it would be treading on Flame Blade's bonuses. So it's now a remarkably cheap buff you can throw on when you don't have anything more urgent to do.

[Catwalk]

How about turning old school Magic: The Gathering and renaming it to Giant Growth, making it +1 sword and shield as a combat spell only for 5 mana?

[Vagabond]

So, last call for spell changes. There are enough other things still being discussed I'd like to lock down spells. Thanks.

[Catwalk]

I still prefer Invulnerability at strength 2. It's one of the best ways to counter multi-figure units, while not being terribly effective against single-figure units. Spells like that are really important in order to balance out multi-figure advantages IMO.

How about my Giant Growth suggestion?

[Vagabond]

I still prefer Invulnerability at strength 2. It's one of the best ways to counter multi-figure units, while not being terribly effective against single-figure units. Spells like that are really important in order to balance out multi-figure advantages IMO.

How about my Giant Growth suggestion?

I'll switch back Invulnerability for now, but we'll certainly want to keep an eye on it. I suspect it'll still be overpowered, but it's very hard to be certain with all the other numbers we're throwing around.

I'm fine with Giant Strength at 5 cost. I'm comparing it to Fire Bolt. Giant strength gives +1 attack.figure on the attack, Fire Bolt gives a strength 8 attack(at 5 mana). You'll get more swords from Giant Strength than Fire Bolt baseline, assuming 2-3 attacks (5-6 figures first, 3-4, 1-2) with a unit before it dies off, but Fire Bolt can be boosted. All in all they seem comparable. Add in +1 shield and you've got a stacking issue with Stone Skin. +1 attack, +4 defense is considerable for a couple easy to get spells. It's no Heroism, but I believe I've made my feelings on Heroism clear already.

[Catwalk]

I think Giant Strength and Fire Bolt are hard to compare. One gives instant damage anywhere on the battlefield, the other requires you to have a unit in range and is heavily dependent on how many figures are in that unit.

The main suggestion was to make it a combat spell only in order to distinguish it a bit more from other buffs. I don't think Giant Growth + Stone Skin would be overpowered. If it were, shouldn't you be more concerned about Stone Skin + Holy Armour + Heroism? Resistance is a good counter to buffed up units, and by itself the combo does nothing to harm dangerous enemy units that need to be taken out fast.

Pretty please with catnip on top?

[Vagabond]

The main suggestion was to make it a combat spell only in order to distinguish it a bit more from other buffs. I don't think Giant Growth + Stone Skin would be overpowered. If it were, shouldn't you be more concerned about Stone Skin + Holy Armour + Heroism? Resistance is a good counter to buffed up units, and by itself the combo does nothing to harm dangerous enemy units that need to be taken out fast.

I am concerned about pretty much anything + heroism. I don't use Heroism for comparison because I haven't come up with a fix to the spell that anyone likes. I still think about it, but nothing productive comes from my ruminations. I mentioned Stone Skin + Giant Growth because they're both the same color basic spells. Is it a huge imbalance? Nah, not even close. Just the sort of thing I watch out for. And really, +1 sword for 5 mana seems fine. If you'd prefer a different comparison, look at Weakness. +1 guaranteed sword vs -2 swords w/ chance to resist. Both 5 mana. I'll keep Giant Strength for now. Though for later spell changes I'm now thinking of a beefier combat spell Giant Growth that could give +health and +attack. Would have to watch for overlap with Lion Heart though.

[Catwalk]

Alright, I'll let you have that one. I'll suggest it again for v3.0 though, after seeing how it all plays out.