Magister Modmod

Okay. I have just teched to Divine Essence in a regular game. And I was not able to build the Stir from Slumber. So now, either Illians, or No one, are able to summon a dragon. Im not sure which one it is.

How about unique resources for Malakim? Dates in oasis, salt in deserts, and maybe +1 in oasis, and another +1 at sanitation (or just allow Malakim to build improvements in oasis). Not sure if it's possible, but making the desert shrine provide +1 and +1 exp for divine units for each desert square in the city radius might make deserts worth preserving (maybe linked to some religious tech). Maybe take to food portion of the trader trait from Wildmana and give it to Malakim as a civ trait to represent the reliance on trade often associated with desert civilizations. Maybe I just need to try my hands at modmodding.

seizer said:

How about unique resources for Malakim? Dates in oasis, salt in deserts, and maybe +1 in oasis, and another +1 at sanitation (or just allow Malakim to build improvements in oasis). Not sure if it's possible, but making the desert shrine provide +1 and +1 exp for divine units for each desert square in the city radius might make deserts worth preserving (maybe linked to some religious tech). Maybe take to food portion of the trader trait from Wildmana and give it to Malakim as a civ trait to represent the reliance on trade often associated with desert civilizations. Maybe I just need to try my hands at modmodding.

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Some of what you suggested is possible, some (the desert giving xp and so on) is not without lots of python.

Salt and Camels are both in RifE, and the Malakim have a full line of Camel riders.

Honestly, I've always wanted the ability to have something like this:The Malakim in RifE have a civtrait title 'Merchant'The starting gold is to help them build some Bedouin Sits initially, as those cost money to build.

How does from work ? I believe I undersadrand from but have no idea about food :>

Same way does, you just get instead. Can get as well.

Dean_the_Young said:

Sounds interesting, Magister.

What was that "Something Completely Different" spell of the Grigori you were talking about? And that unique mage unit you were thinking of? Sounded... different.

I take it you did your remake of the magic system, like you've always talked about?

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I did not add it to this version, but often I allow Grigori Adventurers to revert back to their un-upgraded form in order to take a different upgrade path.

I was thinking I'd need to give them UUs in order to prevent them from exploiting the free promotion pics that arcane units get when created, but then I realized that if i made the spell work through Python that I could reduce the promotion pics without any UUs needed. As i don't want to nerf all Grigori unitcombat_adept units, that sounds like a better approach.


I made some tweaks to the magic system, but this version is less ambitious in that regard than many others. I don't have any cross-sphere spells in it, nor a second spell for most of the 3rd level spell spheres.

Tasunke said:

Okay. I have just teched to Divine Essence in a regular game. And I was not able to build the Stir from Slumber. So now, either Illians, or No one, are able to summon a dragon. Im not sure which one it is.

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That's odd. I distinctly recall finishing the ritual as another civ in my version, although I don't recall the dragon spells actually working in this version.

Maybe I forgot to include the CIV4ProjectInfos.xml among the files I uploaded? Can you still only build Rites of Oghma once?


Edit: I just unzipped the folder I uploaded to check, and I was right about leaving that file out.

seizer said:

How about unique resources for Malakim? Dates in oasis, salt in deserts, and maybe +1 in oasis, and another +1 at sanitation (or just allow Malakim to build improvements in oasis). Not sure if it's possible, but making the desert shrine provide +1 and +1 exp for divine units for each desert square in the city radius might make deserts worth preserving (maybe linked to some religious tech). Maybe take to food portion of the trader trait from Wildmana and give it to Malakim as a civ trait to represent the reliance on trade often associated with desert civilizations. Maybe I just need to try my hands at modmodding.

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Extra resources in the desert are a definite possibility eventually, but I don't intend to include anything that requires extra art any time soon. (Of course, if one of the art people chose to make nice Satyr Druid, Satyr Beastmaster, and Satyr Yvain then I'd likely change my mind pretty quickly.)



In particular I was thinking I'd like to add that "rare desert plant, the extracts of which can cause a man pain like he's never known for as long as he lives" which Decius claims the Undercouncil taught him about. It would be made visible at Deception, and would at the very least provide free Poisoned Blade promotions for all recon units (the way Nightmares provide the Nightmare promotion to mounted units).

I don't think that extra yields for one civ from a feature is possible with the base FfH SDK. I may consider it if/when I use FF's/Lena's/my own DLL in the future.

I don't really like having civ specific techs liek Seafaring or the Swampdwelling tech FF's lizardmen have, so I don't think I have any resource visible only to them. I might however consider allowing some resources to be harvested only through their Bedoin Encampments, if I add those.



I have often opted to allow the Malakim to build in Oases as well as Scrub.

Granting disciples xp based on (non-flood plain) desert tiles near the city (not technically the city radius, as cycling through a square area around the city is far easier) was actually a feature of several of my older, unreleased versions. I may very well add that in again. I don't have any of those versions saved on my new laptop, but the code was pretty simple. It wasn't the most efficient code, but there was no noticeable performance drop. I could also add more xp for having the Mirror of Heaven nearby, or even more easily just somewhere within Malakim borders.

(Hmm...I just thought of an easy way to give Elohim disciples xp based on the unique feature they control. That too might be a nice feature.)


I'm not sure the rest of your suggestions are possible/worth the prerequisite SDK work.

In my last FF based version Malakim disciples gain the Ascetic promotion in deserts, which increased their spell strengths, gave more free xp, and allowed them to access Sun magic.

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That would cause the Malakim to keep a few desert tiles, locating stacks of disciples here, and spring the rest.

No other spell represents the Spirit sphere as well.

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Escaping the consequences of your evil acts is all what Spirit is about, then?

Lone Wolf said:

That would cause the Malakim to keep a few desert tiles, locating stacks of disciples here, and spring the rest.

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You're probably right. Of course, I could make it so that the promotion only works when the disciple in alone in its desert tile. (I just realized that I don't needFF's DLL, as I could use a spell that has its effect in it pyprereq, like I do for Auric Ascended's Snowfall_passive.

The xp based on desert tiles around a Desert Shrine is probably better though, even if for no other reason than that it does not have to be called nearly as often.

Escaping the consequences of your evil acts is all what Spirit is about, then?

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All of what is it about? No. A huge part of what it stands for? Yes. That is why Junil and Sirona have never really gotten along.

A major aspect of Spirit is forgiving those who have not yet repented, as well as those who claim to have repented but continually backslide and show no sign of changing their behavior. Lugus will forgive, but not forget, and will save the forgiveness until after there are clear signs that repentance was real. Sirona freely forgives and forgets, knowing that it is often easier for the wicked to repent when they no longer fear punishment and that the experience of grace often creates in the hearts of others a sense that they have the duty to repay the kindness shown them.


The other main aspects are compassion and calming/comforting those who are distraught. Spirit is also about altruism, about acting in ways contrary to one's own rational self interest. Choosing not to raise the AC even though it would help you and hurt your enemies is very much in keeping with Spirit. The Goddess of Wisdom teaches a wisdom that seems foolishness to the world. She would teach that man are free to sin all they wish and will always be forgiven, but should choose not to sin out of love for their fellow man instead of out of fear of consequences. If you are thinking about what you can do instead of what you should do, then you are in totally the wrong mindset to use Spirit correctly.

If you are thinking about what you can do instead of what you should do, then you are in totally the wrong mindset to use Spirit correctly.

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I propose inserting code which analyses the human player's mindset, and if the mindset is wrong, refuses the human player the ability to use Spirit. Or maybe changes it into Laroth-type things (interesting idea for a fallen Elohim, BTW).

Anyway, I am stealing some of your ideas for my personal modmod.

I look forward to playing around with this, even with the couple of bugs or problems that seem to have been identified in the preceding pages. Always liked the FF quote/popup for whenever Great Sage Magister Cultuum was born, the business about always messing around with an alternate universe in the tower of alteration, and if MC ever pulled it off, the quoted person would be moving there, ha ha. Again, will be neat to get a good peek at your vision, thanks for sharing!

Lone Wolf said:

I propose inserting code which analyses the human player's mindset, and if the mindset is wrong, refuses the human player the ability to use Spirit. Or maybe changes it into Laroth-type things (interesting idea for a fallen Elohim, BTW).

Anyway, I am stealing some of your ideas for my personal modmod.

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That sounds way too hard, but I very well might eventually make the spells depend on alignment. Eventually the mod should include Broader Alignments, and actions that raise the AC would shift them towards evil. (The Counselor UU would probably only be available if they stayed good.)


What kind of evil spirit spells would you propose? Maybe something that causes the entire population of an enemy city to despair/be overcome by strong emotions/become way too complacent (like the people of the planet Miranda in Serenity) thus causing massive unhappiness or a revolt?

... It's the third sign of the apocalypse! Magister's Mod. Wow.

... So I guess that'd make the AC at 40? 50, if you don't count the warning as a sign of the apocalypse.

well, a Miranda spell would be to stop city production for a set amount of turns, allowing them to starve all the while. (as well as not create any commerce or hammers) evil spirit III?

a despair spell could be increased city anger for a set amount of turns. evil spirit II?

evil spirit I could be False hope ... not exactly sure, maybe representing being caught off gaurd, or something to do with fear.

It is a true joy to download and dissect your modmod, Magister. I learn many things from your code.

Also, rest assure that I will steal some of your idea for my personal modmod (Creation, Force and Dimensional spells, to mention a few, and of course how you made Promotion_Vampire enables learning death spells...)

A quick question : what is the spell for Water II? It seems I couldn't find it.

Probably a bug : You wrote effectHeraldsBlessing, but actually there is no effectHeraldsBlessing in python. Perhaps it is effectHeraldsCall instead?

wonder whts plan for next upgrade

esvath said:

It is a true joy to download and dissect your modmod, Magister. I learn many things from your code.

Also, rest assure that I will steal some of your idea for my personal modmod (Creation, Force and Dimensional spells, to mention a few, and of course how you made Promotion_Vampire enables learning death spells...)

A quick question : what is the spell for Water II? It seems I couldn't find it.

Probably a bug : You wrote effectHeraldsBlessing, but actually there is no effectHeraldsBlessing in python. Perhaps it is effectHeraldsCall instead?

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I'm actually not that happy with all my spells, especially in the Creation sphere. Creation I-III and Force II were essentially just placeholders I chose to use while I sorted out the bugs in older python spells that mysteriously broke/come up with a better Mind I spell so I can have a Creation spell called Inspiration. (Actually, I'm not sure I still have the code from those versions so I'd have to rewrite them from scratch if I want to go back to the old functionality.)


Vampire allows learning Death, Body, Mind, and Shadow spells (level 1 and 2). Similarly, Druidic allows Nature I-III, Life I-III, and Creation II-III.

I didn't make the promotions give special permission like I might have in an FF based mod, I simply make all spellspheres availible to more unitcombats and added alternate prereqs. Units taught by Govannon might not gain any spell spheres, but if they get Channeling promotions you can pick them yourselves. In case no one has noticed yet, Govannon's ability to Teach Magic is no longer a spell, but a completely passive ability that does not prevent him from being used like a regular Archmage. It is a perTurn effect of the Magically Liberal promotion, which can never be purchased and only he starts with but which can spread to his students. It is not as common, but he can train Channeling II and even Channeling III too, although the latter requires repeatedly risking his like in the Cave trials. (He needs to become The Caswallawn in order for you to make your whole army Archmage equivalents.) Channeling promotions were removed from Priests and Druids mostly to prevent abusing Govannon too much. (Priests and High Priests of Winter still use Channeling promotions, at least for now, but I don't expect many of them to be on the same team as Govannon.)



Water II has no spell; instead, the promotion includes all the effects of Water Walking. It is functionally the same as in normal FfH, except with slightly less micromanagement and a less clutter from too many promotions.

The main reason for removing the Water Walking spell was so that i would not have 2 spells with the same name and different effects; Speakers (High Priests of the Overlords) have been given a second spell which allows them to give a Temporary Water Walking promotion to a whole stack. Stygian Guards lost the ability to move in Oceans, but both they and Drowns gain that ability with Theology. (In this version OO is weaker early on, but extremely powerful in the late game.)

I eventually may remove the normal Water Walking promotion (or rather remove the temporary variety and make the normal one temporary), as I believe I can just use the CanMoveAllterrain tag in the unit defines of the units that use it.


The one other spell sphere promotion without a spell is Dimensional II. It actually does have a spell, but not one cast by the unit with the promotion. Abjure is instead cast by summons, who are sacrificed ("sent back to their home plane") in exchange for giving the Dimensional II unit their xp.


Yeah, I meant to use effectHeraldsCall. The main point of that promotion was to allow the Mercurians to get angels from units killed by the spell, which was not happening in FfH's method of giving the units limited duration. I think moving the python from the spell to the pyPerTurn effect makes the code slightly more efficient too, at least in stasks with a lot of non-living units.






So, what do people think of the Blue Dragon idea?



I never got around to checking if this works with the scenarios. Has anyone else? I know I'd have to remove some Channeling I promotions to prevent too many units from accessing too many spell spheres, but I'm not sure if they would load right or not as I don't have it saved under the default FfH name.

MagisterCultuum said:

So, what do people think of the Blue Dragon idea?

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You're far more knowldgeable than I about all matters Erbusian, but aren't dragons and titans the gods equiavlent of WMDs and wasn't Leviathan, Danalin's WMD.

In the thread you also mentioned you didn't have a name for your Blue Dragon. Leviathan itself is Biblical (Job 41), but I guess you could raid Norse Mythology for the Midgard Serpent (The terms Svartalfar and Ljosalfar are drawn from Norse) or the Lambtom Wyrm (thought that was a river, not a sea, but all rivers lead to the sea...) as sources of inspiration to draw upon. Ryujin (Sea dragon from Japan) is another option.

MagisterCultuum said:

Yeah, I meant to use effectHeraldsCall. The main point of that promotion was to allow the Mercurians to get angels from units killed by the spell, which was not happening in FfH's method of giving the units limited duration. I think moving the python from the spell to the pyPerTurn effect makes the code slightly more efficient too, at least in stasks with a lot of non-living units.

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It is not!? I rarely use Herald's Call but I swear I read some strategy that synergize Herald's Call with Mercurians getting angels from their living units.

Yes, what you did with Promo_Vampire doesn't require FF schema but able to do the same thing. That is what I learn from you. Making shortcuts in XML/Py to do what I want

I'm thinking I probably made the Dimensional sphere too strong, but I don't really want to change it. Instead, I'm thinking it would be appropriate for it to have the opposite passive effect as its opposite sphere. Just as Enchantment mana causes happiness, Dimensional will probably cause unhappiness in the nest version. That seems appropriate for the sphere of The Lady of Pain, which is largely about obsessing over past wrongs and measuring one's self worth purely through external circumstances.

Jabie said:

You're far more knowldgeable than I about all matters Erbusian, but aren't dragons and titans the gods equiavlent of WMDs and wasn't Leviathan, Danalin's WMD.

In the thread you also mentioned you didn't have a name for your Blue Dragon. Leviathan itself is Biblical (Job 41), but I guess you could raid Norse Mythology for the Midgard Serpent (The terms Svartalfar and Ljosalfar are drawn from Norse) or the Lambtom Wyrm (thought that was a river, not a sea, but all rivers lead to the sea...) as sources of inspiration to draw upon. Ryujin (Sea dragon from Japan) is another option.

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I already said I don't want to make up a name for him myself. Having him nameless better fits the mystery of the Octopus Overlords, who I'm thinking are the ones trying to revive him so that they can use his madness to their own ends.


My first thought if I were to make up a name would be to go to the name of Leviathan's mate. I thought I remembered this being mentioned in Jewish tradition, but the closest I could find was that the pair of beasts together were called the Taninim. (Usually that plural term is applies to all dangerous sea creatures, but Rabbinical tradition says it refers to the legend of Leviathan and its mate, whom God killed because the species was to powerful to be allowed to reproduce.) I guess I could also try Tiamat, or better yet a more obscure variant of it like Thalatth. (I'm not sure why, but I feel like the name should start with a T.) I always pictures this dragon as male, but if Condatis can be a female archangel with a name of a male god then this can be a male dragon with the name of a female deity.



Yes, Dragons are divine WMD and yes, Leviathan is one of Danalin's WMDs, but that does not men he was the only one. Many gods created many different kinds of beasts, and Kael has stated that some even created arsenals of dozens or even hundreds or thousands of dragons. The Elohim entry speaks of Sirona as having at least a whole Phalanx of Titans in her service. (I suspect the strength of each beast was inversely proportional to the number the god created though. Most of the weaker dragons were were slain long ago and are unlikely to rise again. I like to think that Agares has more dragons in his arsenal than any god, but that these are all beasts who had been created to serve good gods and were seduced to the dark side.)

Having leviathan serve Danalin does not mean that The Great Blue Dragon did not serve him too. He could have very well created an army of Blue Dragons, with the Great Blue Dragon being merely its leader and most impressive specimen. The only reference to a Blue Dragon in Kael's posts is the Great Blue Dragon who lived in Luciaqua's pool, and so was clearly a creature of water.

esvath said:

It is not!? I rarely use Herald's Call but I swear I read some strategy that synergize Herald's Call with Mercurians getting angels from their living units.

Yes, what you did with Promo_Vampire doesn't require FF schema but able to do the same thing. That is what I learn from you. Making shortcuts in XML/Py to do what I want

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It claims it workd like that in game, but I don't think it actually has either since the move to BtS or the streamlining of magic. I saw that in the bug thread a couple months ago, and when I tested it I never got any angels, hence the new version of the spell.

Well, when you do your next update to cover all those files you forgot, I'll be sure to give it a playthrough.

Without a bit more familiarity with how you tweaked the Overlords, and other religions, I can't quite say for sure, but it seems like it might be a tad overpowered. Wouldn't being the first to build Hemah allow you to awaken the Blue Dragon, giving you two WMD's at that point, which I think is still earlier than Strength of Will?

Even on its own, a Dragon is pretty darn powerful. I suppose this was your Overlord-land-monster to the Mithril Golem* and the Meshaber of Dis? Does the Order have a new goody?

*You finally get around to boosting the Mithril Golem with magic immunity and earth affinity like you'd talked about?