Magic Damage and Magic Resistance

[MiKa523]

I realized that I never really use the magic resistance promotions, although they can probably be useful in some situations like when you are facing pyre zombies or cultists.

In my experience the problem is that:
-it's only available with combat 3, so you can't give new units those resistance promotions in most cases
-units have to skip other important promotions in order to be resistant
-it costs too many promotions to have magic resistance for all kinds of magic damage
-it just takes some more attackers/spellcasters with magic damage to deal the full damage to magic resistant defenders


I think it would enhance the diversity of the spell system, if units had easier access to magic resistance promotions, because it would be easier to counter, for example, the enemy's fireballs or maelstorms and thus forcing the enemy to make use of more different spells and their magic damage.
That's why I'd like to see no (or Combat I) requirements for the magic resistance promotion.


Of course, I might be way off and the majority might be fully satisfied with how this works, so I made a poll to see what other ppl think.

What are your suggestions, if you rarely use those promotions?

 

[Sarisin]

The only time I have used them is in the example you use - with a Pyre Zombie threat.

Or, when I have run out of other available promotions.

 

[Grey Fox]

With Amurites, when having a power standoff in a MP game with Sheaim as closest neighbour, I made a habit of going to Combat III and then picking Magic Resistance on all my Adepts. Then when they were Mages (which they were instantly because of my XP setup with form of titan, civics and Cave of Ancestors), I taught them all of Govannon's lvl 1 mana promotions, and made Earth II a high priority on my mages. With the Earth 2 spell (Stoneskin) and Magic Resistance all my mages had an inate 70%(?) resistance to all elements.

 

[[to_xp]Gekko]

I totally agree with the OP, and think that most promotions should not require that you get other promotions first. this way you can further customize your army to your needs instead of being able to do so just with experienced units.

 

[Jules.lt]

Maybe require KoE, so your choice don't get crowded too fast?

 

[kumquatelvis]

I would use them a lot if the AI used magic worth anything. However, most games I am the only one throwing around tsunamis and maelstroms like mad, so they're worthless (to me, anyway. The AI would be smart to have all it's units resist cold after I drown the first several cities, but I don't think that it's all that reactive).

 

[PotatoOverdose]

Actually, I was surprised by the Amurites in my last game. They built Fire II Wizards and actually used fireball properly against my stacks.

 

[Nimbus]

In my current game as the Infernals I gave it to every unit that I could as soon as they were eligible for it. With Hannah and her world spell and Basium and his world spell coming at some point in the game it really helped save the lives of a lot of my experienced units that other wise could have died.

 

[KillerClowns]

IIRC, magic resistance leads to poison resistance. I really, really, really hate the Scorpion Clan goblins, for reasons irrational as much as rational. Ergo, I tend to use Magic Resistance a lot, as much for poison resistance that comes next as dealing with magical nuisances.

 

[WarKirby]

Magic resistance is just too weak. 20% is't worth a promotion slot to me, over so many other things.

I might use it if it were 40%

 

[MaxAstro]

Magic Resistance itself is occasionally useful, especially on heroes.

The promotions it leads to, however, are basically NEVER worth it. By the time you have enough levels to consider those promotions, you are asking questions like, "Which do I need more, Fire Resistance or Heroic Strength?". Guess which of those wins?

 

[far_wanderer]

My experience has been that Magic Resistance is only useful against certain specific threats that get spammed a lot in the rare cases that they show up, like Pyre Zombies.
I would suggest bumping the strength of Magic Resistance up to 50%, but removing the specialized promotions that come after. That way you still get most of the benefit that is available now without having to waste an additional even more specialized promotion on it. And in the unlikely situation that Pyre Zombies, Tsunamis, and Maelstroms are all coming at you with great frequency at the same time, you won't have to specialize your troops for each individual threat.

 

[MiKa523]

You would make the MR promotion a no-brainer by buffing it to 50% and removing the following promotions.
And specializing your troops for different kinds of threats seems rather appealing to me or Gekko for instance

I'd rather like to see MR removed and give straight access to those following promotions.
This way you still need to spend more promotions to be resistant to different kinds of magic, but one promotion is enough to soft-counter an enemy using only one way of magic.
The easier access balances with the fact that you loose the 20% of MR and can only get 50% resistance instead of 70% (not mentioning other promotions and spells that increase resistance further).

 

[Thunder_Gr]

My experience has been that Magic Resistance is only useful against certain specific threats that get spammed a lot in the rare cases that they show up, like Pyre Zombies.
I would suggest bumping the strength of Magic Resistance up to 50%, but removing the specialized promotions that come after. That way you still get most of the benefit that is available now without having to waste an additional even more specialized promotion on it. And in the unlikely situation that Pyre Zombies, Tsunamis, and Maelstroms are all coming at you with great frequency at the same time, you won't have to specialize your troops for each individual threat.

The magic users have to be specialized in order to use specific types of magic damage, why our troops shouldn't be forced to specialize also?
However, I did not consider magic resistance uprades up to now, since the magic using AI was worthless. This may change now, as I see that AI is using magic more effectivelly.
I would like the promotions to be available right away though. Why should a unit have combat III in order to get magic resistance? I do not think combat training is related in anyway to the magic resistance.
Magic resistance is mostly a racial and equipment matter, meaning that, either your race has specific resistances/weaknesses to damage types caused by magic, or you give them equipment that apply magic resistance to them.

 

[MaxAstro]

You would make the MR promotion a no-brainer by buffing it to 50% and removing the following promotions.
And specializing your troops for different kinds of threats seems rather appealing to me or Gekko for instance

I'd rather like to see MR removed and give straight access to those following promotions.
This way you still need to spend more promotions to be resistant to different kinds of magic, but one promotion is enough to soft-counter an enemy using only one way of magic.
The easier access balances with the fact that you loose the 20% of MR and can only get 50% resistance instead of 70% (not mentioning other promotions and spells that increase resistance further).

I don't like that; Magic Resistance is a lot more useful than the following promotions, because it protects against non-damaging spells like Dominate and Rust. I'd rather see Magic Resistance slightly buffed and the following promotions removed than the reverse.

I agree that 50% would be too much, though.

 

[MiKa523]

I see your point and I agree that MR has its uses besides resistance to damage types, but if you buff MR and remove the following promotions, it becomes a no-brainer and you can't specialize your troops towards a certain direction depending on the enemy's spells.

One could only make MR and all the following resistance promotions available at start so you have the choice between broadly based but weak resistances or stronger resistances covering only one kind of damage.

 

[far_wanderer]

My understanding is that the entire point of this thread is that Magic Resistance should be a no-brainer when facing arcane units. The same way Cover is a no-brainer against Archery, Shock against Melee, City Garrison to defend, etc. All of these promotions should be immediately taken whenever the unit in question is likely to use them. The problem with Magic Resistance as it is now is that it is often disregarded even in situations where Magic Resistance as a concept should be valuable because the other promotions are still more efficient.
The secondary promotions are even more useless because they come up so rarely. Lightning Resistance gives you 50% resistance against only two spells, compare that to Cover which gives you a 40% bonus on attack and defense against an entire class of units.
It is also important for Magic Resistance to stay fairly high on the promotion tree, because unlike other unit types Mages take a lot of time to build up, and so their counter should not be available immediately. That said, MR usually ends up being a more important counter to non-Mage things like Pyre Zombies, so perhaps it might be better to split it up into two, the first at Combat 1 giving a 25% resistance to damage, and the other at Combat 3 with the other 25% and the current chance to resist spells.

 

[Grand Seeker]

I'm playing a game where I meet a lot of diseased corpses and to me it seems like Magic resistance helps avoid being diseased.

 

[Sarisin]

I'm playing a game where I meet a lot of diseased corpses and to me it seems like Magic resistance helps avoid being diseased.

Really? I can't see how that would work as Disease is not a spell as far as I know. I find when I am fighting those damned Corpses that they seem to have about a 50% chance of giving disease to my units - but they usually don't have Magic Resistance.

 

[WarKirby]

Why is everyone suggesting buffing MR and removing the following promotions?

What's wrong with vuffing MR AND keeping the following promotions? If MR was 40%, and there were the 50% promotions too, it would allow a unit a max of 90% resistance to one damage type, which would actually be useful

I'd also support the notion of making MR available from the start, or perhaps after only one combat promotion, rather than 3.