This is my "todo" list for the next version, including quite a lot of ideas where I would like to hear some opinions first :
1. Dispel Magic works on Magic Vortexes. I don't think it should, it's not even a unit enchantment... (same for Dispelling Wave)
2. You can dispel Warp Node in combat and unlike dispelling city buffs, this effect is permanent. Do we care to have this feature? I believe the overland map is where combat unrelated overland spells should be dispelled at...
But if we do want to keep it, the very least it should be limited to only dispel Warp Node spells cast by other players, not yourself.
2b. Which btw is something we should also do for overland dispelling of Warp Node as well. Originally it didn't store an owner but it does now so checking for it being your own or not is possible. This also makes it possible in theory for the spell to resist dispelling according to normal rules (Specialist and Runemaster applying), although fixing that might make the AI's strategy suboptimal (dispel nodes first, cities second).
3. The AI is incapable of casting Wall of Fire and Wall of Shadows in battle, obviously I'll fix this.
4. Merchant offered item sales should scale their budget based on turn count. Buying a Haste or Regeneration item on turn 50 can be an issue. (ofc finding them is still a possibility but unlike lair items that are guarded by harder monsters the better they are, the merchant merely needs you to have the gold ready.) I don't remember but maybe we already have something like this, just not very well adjusted?
5. The chance of 1 pick, 2 picks or very rare spell should be weighted. Right now it's 1/3 for each, while before the pick generation related update, it was 2 single picks and 2.5 very rares for 0.9 doublepicks. So double picks are currently more than twice as frequent as they used to be and this change was not intended. Not sure what's out preference, 1:2:3 or 1:2:2 for double,single and very rare spell or maybe something entirely different? Note that double picks tend to benefit the human player slightly more (as they are more expensive and are placed into harder nodes the AI can only beat later) while single picks tend to be more valueable for the AI (who is somewhat more likely to pick these up in a way that results in getting actual very rare spells out of it instead of just a random offcolor 1st book). Very rare spells are a middle ground as the AI is more likely to get a very rare spell by opening it late enough, but they have a higher budget requirement than single picks so the human player has a better chance to find them first especially if playing fast strategies. The difference is small though (1200 budget vs 800).
6. After completing my ongoing troll game, I probably should try playing a few games using Sapher's "undead hydra/behemoth" strategy. If testing shows it is a problem, changing Warp Creature to scale the chance of success based on target creature tier might be a good solution. So instead of the current "Save at -5" we could have "Save at -X or there is Y chance of effect" where Y would be 100% on uncommon and lower, but less on rare and even less on very rare targets. This even allows a larger X than the current. We might even want to consider this regardless of the test results. I don't mind the very rare creatures getting killed at a low chance but I do mind if they come back as undead in 1403-1405 consistently enough to win games with it.
Edit : Alternately, we can make a new rule "regenerating supernatural creatures can't turn undead".
7a. Mystic Surge should not be possible to Dispel. This is simple, if it can be dispelled, the player gets a free chance to recast the spell and reroll for even more and better buffs. Obviously the buffs themselves remain dispellable, just not Mystic Surge itself.
7b. Mystic Surge maybe shouldn't add invisibility. Again simple : invisible units can't be targeted by dispel magic so the AI can't counter it by dispelling even if they had the mana. So rolling this gives you a free pass of "cast spells until turn 25 then enemy retreats". That's okay for Sorcery at rare, idk how I feel about it in chaos at uncommon.
8. What if Wall of Fire added a strategic combat bonus to units like normal City Walls do, except to their attack power?
9. What if Fortress Lighting was scaled by the Difficulty setting for AI players? I feel it's way too effective as a way to eliminate unwanted neutrals for the human player at the current strength and the only reason it was ever raised (or added to the game) was the AI needing it. I understand why it needs to be the same effect for Normal and Fair difficulty, but I'm fine if the player beats those levels with life buffed swordsmen so they do fine with a lower lightning strength. It should only be impossible on the higher difficulties. Alternately it could be limited to the first X turns of battle, but unlimited for the AI on high enough difficulty?
10. Alternately what if neutrals were a bit harder to manipulate? If every city on the map had a "constant random" modifier to their priority, it'll become harder to make neutrals attack a different city. Unfortunately, if the random amount is too high the monsters will target very suboptimally, and if it's too low they are still easy to manipulate. So this might not be a good idea, I don't think I can make good formula for it.
11. Now that caster vs death demons is actually random instead of predetermined, maybe the chance of caster demons should be higher than 50%? (You still get 100% Death demons when the battle unit total is over 18, that's unavaoidable. Death demons were made with the purpose to ensure caster demons in those slots don't crash the game.)
That's all on my list at the moment.
1. Dispel Magic works on Magic Vortexes. I don't think it should, it's not even a unit enchantment... (same for Dispelling Wave)
2. You can dispel Warp Node in combat and unlike dispelling city buffs, this effect is permanent. Do we care to have this feature? I believe the overland map is where combat unrelated overland spells should be dispelled at...
But if we do want to keep it, the very least it should be limited to only dispel Warp Node spells cast by other players, not yourself.
2b. Which btw is something we should also do for overland dispelling of Warp Node as well. Originally it didn't store an owner but it does now so checking for it being your own or not is possible. This also makes it possible in theory for the spell to resist dispelling according to normal rules (Specialist and Runemaster applying), although fixing that might make the AI's strategy suboptimal (dispel nodes first, cities second).
3. The AI is incapable of casting Wall of Fire and Wall of Shadows in battle, obviously I'll fix this.
4. Merchant offered item sales should scale their budget based on turn count. Buying a Haste or Regeneration item on turn 50 can be an issue. (ofc finding them is still a possibility but unlike lair items that are guarded by harder monsters the better they are, the merchant merely needs you to have the gold ready.) I don't remember but maybe we already have something like this, just not very well adjusted?
5. The chance of 1 pick, 2 picks or very rare spell should be weighted. Right now it's 1/3 for each, while before the pick generation related update, it was 2 single picks and 2.5 very rares for 0.9 doublepicks. So double picks are currently more than twice as frequent as they used to be and this change was not intended. Not sure what's out preference, 1:2:3 or 1:2:2 for double,single and very rare spell or maybe something entirely different? Note that double picks tend to benefit the human player slightly more (as they are more expensive and are placed into harder nodes the AI can only beat later) while single picks tend to be more valueable for the AI (who is somewhat more likely to pick these up in a way that results in getting actual very rare spells out of it instead of just a random offcolor 1st book). Very rare spells are a middle ground as the AI is more likely to get a very rare spell by opening it late enough, but they have a higher budget requirement than single picks so the human player has a better chance to find them first especially if playing fast strategies. The difference is small though (1200 budget vs 800).
6. After completing my ongoing troll game, I probably should try playing a few games using Sapher's "undead hydra/behemoth" strategy. If testing shows it is a problem, changing Warp Creature to scale the chance of success based on target creature tier might be a good solution. So instead of the current "Save at -5" we could have "Save at -X or there is Y chance of effect" where Y would be 100% on uncommon and lower, but less on rare and even less on very rare targets. This even allows a larger X than the current. We might even want to consider this regardless of the test results. I don't mind the very rare creatures getting killed at a low chance but I do mind if they come back as undead in 1403-1405 consistently enough to win games with it.
Edit : Alternately, we can make a new rule "regenerating supernatural creatures can't turn undead".
7a. Mystic Surge should not be possible to Dispel. This is simple, if it can be dispelled, the player gets a free chance to recast the spell and reroll for even more and better buffs. Obviously the buffs themselves remain dispellable, just not Mystic Surge itself.
7b. Mystic Surge maybe shouldn't add invisibility. Again simple : invisible units can't be targeted by dispel magic so the AI can't counter it by dispelling even if they had the mana. So rolling this gives you a free pass of "cast spells until turn 25 then enemy retreats". That's okay for Sorcery at rare, idk how I feel about it in chaos at uncommon.
8. What if Wall of Fire added a strategic combat bonus to units like normal City Walls do, except to their attack power?
9. What if Fortress Lighting was scaled by the Difficulty setting for AI players? I feel it's way too effective as a way to eliminate unwanted neutrals for the human player at the current strength and the only reason it was ever raised (or added to the game) was the AI needing it. I understand why it needs to be the same effect for Normal and Fair difficulty, but I'm fine if the player beats those levels with life buffed swordsmen so they do fine with a lower lightning strength. It should only be impossible on the higher difficulties. Alternately it could be limited to the first X turns of battle, but unlimited for the AI on high enough difficulty?
10. Alternately what if neutrals were a bit harder to manipulate? If every city on the map had a "constant random" modifier to their priority, it'll become harder to make neutrals attack a different city. Unfortunately, if the random amount is too high the monsters will target very suboptimally, and if it's too low they are still easy to manipulate. So this might not be a good idea, I don't think I can make good formula for it.
11. Now that caster vs death demons is actually random instead of predetermined, maybe the chance of caster demons should be higher than 50%? (You still get 100% Death demons when the battle unit total is over 18, that's unavaoidable. Death demons were made with the purpose to ensure caster demons in those slots don't crash the game.)
That's all on my list at the moment.
