Tweaking Spells

[[to_xp]Gekko]

following Wild Mana's trend of only tweaking what feels wrong while leaving most of FFH intact, please use this thread to discuss what spells you feel should be tweaked and why

here are my opinions so far:

"gave a little thought to it, and indeed the new Force III implementation is very weak for a lvl 3 spell. wall of stone is a lvl1 spell that you can get on as many adepts as you want, and it gives 25% defense increase. methinks a 100% defense increase would be much more like it for a spell that you can only get on 4 casters ( aside from liches )

and while we're at it, the whole Law sphere seems to need an overhaul. Loyalty is useless, Valor is very weak for lvl3 and the summon is BORING. actually most summons are, and they would all benefit from some unique ability that would make them stand out compared to each other. MagisterCuultum has some great ideas about this.

some quick ideas:

Loyalty needs some nice sideeffect to make it useful. making it able to prevent units from becoming enraged would be perfect for example. Valor could be moved to lvl2 and the summon could be made a lot more powerful and get some special ability ( hopefully MC will chime in and suggest something, I forgot his idea about this )

Pit Beasts get Cannibalize ( again, I think this his MC's idea )

aside from this, I think Force III is going to be bad no matter what the defense percentage bonus is, since it's an effect already used by Earth I and it seems rather unimaginative to reuse it. Force Push could be nice for a lvl2 Force spell that pushes units on a selected tile 1 tile away, or maybe make it lvl3, "whirlwind-like" and make it work on all the adjacent tiles. then you could add "magic missile" , a ranged attack, and decide its power depending on if you make it lvl2 or lvl3. Escape should go since it's obviously Dimensional I and has nothing to do with Force at all

a couple ideas for Dimensional magic:

Dimensional I is escape, as Kael always said

Dimensional II could be banish. always a nice spell to have, problem is in FFH it's tricky because summons often die on the same turn they're summoned. so if you made Banish work similar to, say, Destroy Undead, it would only be useful on permament summon. solution: make it a defensive spell instead of an offensive one. Banish gives +1000% strength increase against summoned units, effectively making them useless, for one turn. of course the effect will have to stay active until the start of your next turn.

Dimensional III could be Teleport, everyone loves that. Hawk style teleport for example, possibly restricted somewhat if it seems too powerful."

 

[[to_xp]Gekko]

ideas posted by MagisterCultuum:

"I used to generally get rid of Loyalty, move Valor to Law I (often weakening it somewhat, such as by giving it a small change of wearing off), give Einherjar the Guardsman and Valor promotions, and make Unyielding Order Law III. More recently I've left Loyalty untouched (although I d think it should be boosted somehow or removed), enhanced Einherjar the same way, and given Law III both Valor and Unyielding Order. I often also make Valor give +1 xp and +100% xp, but allow Entropy III (I use the old name Enervate rather than Wither) to remove Valor, as well as Courage and Blessed. Valor is also made the Bannor default race.

In one version I replaced Loyalty with Discipline, which allowed passive xp gain for normal combat units.

If Einherjar were moved to Law III, I'd give them Spirit Guide and Demon Slaying too.



Yes, giving Pit Beasts Cannibalize was my idea.

I tend to think Nature III needs Summon Guardian Vines, and that Guardian Vines instead of Druids should be able to cast Entangle. They should also start with Guardian, Woodsman I, Woodsman II, and Vulnerable to Fire, and maybe have a bit of poison strength. As the permanent, immobile summon would be level III now instead of level II was it was before the streamlining, it doesn't need to be blocked in cities or forts as it used to be.


I give my Aureales Perfect Sight, and the ability to target unitcombat_recon and unitclass_assassin/shadow/rathus/alazkan.

I like letting Water Elementals carry DOMAIN_SEA units as cargo, letting you carry ships across land.

Fire Elementals could cast Blaze as they move, or even create (temporary) Flames on their tiles through a python prereq, the way I make Auric's passive Snowfall work.

I like letting Treants act as Priest of the Leaves, plus letting them bombard city defenses. Additionally, I make it so that instead of just creating new forests if they die on a featureless tile they upgrade new forests they die on to forests and forests to ancient forests.




Magic missile really has nothing to do with the real meaning of Force, that is Balance and Consensus.

I like making Force I be Temporance, a spell which adds a similarly named promotion tat gives a bonus vs Holy and Unholy damage, and maybe also Angel and Demon.

A repell spell could be ok, but could be overpowered. In some of my versions I make Force II Repel Divine, which repels only angels, demons, religious heroes, and high priests.


A nice Force III spell could be Summon Runewyn. These are described in the Bestiary as Magic Immune angels who as sent to bring down powerful mages as they can destroy almost any magic with only the slightest touch. I thinking that could target unitcombat_adept units in stacks, and have a change to remove any or all magic promotions (channeling, spell spheres, and magic buffs) from their targets through a <PythonPostCombatLost>

Before the Besiary came out, I was leaning towards making Corindale's Peace spell and/or the Elohim worldspell Sanctuary be Force III. "

 

[[to_xp]Gekko]

other possibilities to explore: making some spells more useful by making them affect the whole stack instead of caster only. would need some nerf or penalties to keep them in check, or maybe move them to a higher tier.

having some spells become stronger as the caster reaches a higher tier could be nice, so for example you could have a mage capable of casting stoneskin on himself, and an archmage capable of of casting it on the whole stack ( possibly limit the number of units that can be affected by a single cast) , or an adept casting spring on the tile he's on while mages and archmages affect a wider range.

waterwalking affecting the whole stack would be awesome as well, I'm pretty sure Orbis has it already or it will have it soon.

and on and on and on....

 

[DioAurion]

You'd have to be careful with the ideas about pumping up lower tier spells as the caster grows into its final form so as not to make magic too OP.

One idea is to make a few spells that make sense to have a higher casting version (such as water walking and stoneskin) into having a 2nd version of themselves that would cost the caster an upgrade to relearn. They would also require lvl 1-3 of the spell sphere before they could be learned, forcing your casters to really specialize to gain the advantage of each. Then make these available at omnipotence. That would solve two problems, one is making higher level casters seem more interesting and the other is making exp gains for archmages viable for something beyond learning a single uber summon spell.

For time sake since Sephi has so much on his plate, I'd think one upgrade per spell sphere would make sense to start with and so that no sphere begins to outshine the others more than they already do.

Some other ideas for a final tier upgrades that the AI could easily be taught to use:

Mind Mastery: Increase the effects of inspiration, perhaps adding a small % increase to science in the city it is cast. Has to be strong enough to warrant leaving an archmage in town.

Shadow Mastery: Base effects of shadow walk but Grants +1 movement to the stack. Stackable with haste.

Sun Mastery: +1 range blinding light. +20% chance spell will be resisted.

Earth and Water as previously stated by Gecko.

Death Mastery: Caster gains +2 base strength and +1 exp gain per combat (Lich only)

Nature Mastery: Poison Blade effect but available for all unit classes in the stack.

Entropy Mastery: Wither carries the positive buff stripping effects as described by Magister. (Lich Only)

Fire Mastery: Summons a shooting star (I've seen the animation available for them) capable of great bombard damage to city defense. Movement based on caster's extended range upgrades.

Air Mastery: Maelstrom with +10% max damage potential.

Spirit Mastery: Similar to Mind Mastery but pump up Hope to give an increase in GP growth in the town it's used.

Ice Mastery: Ice Elemental causes collateral damage to stack equal to fire elemental.

Law Mastery: Einherjar has 7 base strength. Gains spirit guide and demon slaying.

Metamagic Mastery: Dispel Magic gives all mages in stack +30% spell damage buff. Duration 2 turns.

Body Mastery: Haste gains a chance of removing any movement debuff holds and curses on members in the stack. (Imagines hulking warriors overpowering spells through arcane embedded brute force)


That's all I can think of atm. Tell me what you think.

 

[Avahz Darkwood]

My only suggestion is to do what the tweak mod did with the loyalty spell - It allowed it to remove rage (would not stop it from coming back) and kept its base ability.

(ok may not be my only suggestion)

Bring back the guardian vines spell, but have it set as a level 3 nature spell with a limit on the numbers set on the limit of the casters. The guardian vine unit is still in the XML, just not accessible. Could be permanent or given a duration for emergency defense.

 

[Medicine_Man_55]

I think the law spells are the ones most in need of re-tooling.

Avahz's suggestion for Loyalty is a good one, although I think it is a bit situational. Maybe also give units with the Loyalty promotion a small (+10%) city defense bonus? Loyalty would be in line with many other buffs if it had 2 moderate-strong situational effects (mitigate enrage and conversion effects) and one minor ability with broad use.

Compare this to Courage, a well implemented tier 1 buff spell: Courage gives +10% heal rate and immunity to fear. 1 minor ability of broad use and total mitigation of a situational hazard.

I think Valor is a good spell as-is. It isn't spectacular but used liberally it is a strong army building tool. An ideal archmage specialty for a militant civ that is not focused on magic (Bannor, etc).

The problem with Pit Beasts and Host of the Einherjar is that they are intended to stick around for multiple turns during extended, pitched battles but they typically get too wounded after one fight for the extended duration to matter. Cannibalize on Pit Beasts is a good idea. Maybe allowing Hosts to full heal after defending a city would be a good addition?

 

[Monkeyfinger]

Force3 could make the affected city immune to bombardment (the functionality already exists for BtS walls and castles.) Maybe make the garrisons immune to collateral too, I'm not sure if a building can do that though.

Hosts of the Einherjar wouldn't care so much about taking damage if they had a lot more base strength. Give them back their 10 STR and move them back to L3 already. This is how they were during Fire and it worked great.

 

[ExMachina]

Here are some changes I'm planning (some inspired by Magister Cultuum):

-Priors can cast Pillar of Fire instead of Unyielding Order.
-Unyielding Order moved to Law 3.
-Valor moved to Law 2.
-Host of the Einherjar moved to Spirit 2.
--Changed to base 0, +2 Holy, Spirit Affinity 1
--Free Guardsman and Valor promotions
-Spirit Affinity gives Holy damage type.
-Pit Beasts get free Cannibalize promotion.

I play Fall Further, where Chalid lost the Pillar of Fire spell (but he can use Crown of Brilliance as a 3rd tier Empyrean priest). So currently on Seraphs can use Pillar of Fire; since Order priests use the spell in lore, I think they should be able to use it in-game. Plus, the Law sphere seems pretty lacking, so adding Unyielding Order to it may help some.

The Host of the Einherjar fit better in the Spirit sphere IMO, and their pure Holy damage make them great against demons and undead but useless against angels (which I also think is fitting for a guardian-spirit-type holy unit). Spirit Affinity makes you actually want more Spirit mana (*gasp*). I'm trying to think of something new for Spirit 3 (since Trust seriously sucks IMO). I might move a beefed up version of the Einherjar to Spirit 3 (more Holy strength, Spirit Guide and Demon Slaying promotions), but then I'd need something new for Spirit 2 (since Hope also seriously sucks IMO).

Loyalty blocks Enraged in FF, but it only lasts 1 turn (unless you keep the caster in the same stack). I might lower its chance to expire, but it's definitely an improvement. I see the Law sphere as more of a neutral-aligned warlike sphere (I can't imagine the Calabim summoning guardian angel Einherjar units). But Loyalty/Valor/Unyielding Order might not be powerful enough to compete with the other spheres; I may end up adding new spells later.

For Nature, I was considering moving Poisoned Blade to tier 1 (with Treetop Defense), moving Vitalize to tier 2, and possibly a Guardian Vines summon for tier 3. I don't really know what to do with the Nature sphere without stepping on the Druid's toes too much.

Some other spell spheres I'd like to see improved include Mind 1 (Inspiration sucks big time), Mind 3 (remove loss of the promotion on a failed Domination, perhaps increase resist chance), Life, Creation, Force. I'd also REALLY like to add an arcane spell that reveals invisibility, perhaps in the Sun sphere. Currently, the Empyrean religion seems to hold all the tools for seeing units with higher invisibility than animals.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

I really don't see Einherjar as fitting the Spirit sphere. I see no connections between Sirona and Valhalla. We know for a fact however that the Valkyries (which in Norse mythology are sent to bring the Einherjar to Valhalla and prepare them for Ragnorok) in FfH are angels of Junil.


Before I decided to make valor the Bannor default race, I was seriously considering changing how the Host of the Einherjar work. They would no longer be summoned. Instead, when a unit with the Valor promotion died it would have a chance to return to its owner as an Einherjar, keeping its promotions and xp so long as you keep it fighting enough to not move on to the afterlife. (This might involve making the units return to their owners instead of becoming Angels or Manes, but then when they finally die having them have a chance to move on to the Infernals or Mercurians the way they would have immediately without the Valor promotion.)

I'd also let the Mercurian Valkyrie unit create Einherjar much the same was as Werewolves create Ravernous werewolves.


I do make Spirit mana provide holy damage. In my version the Elohim have a Counselor (when first added called the Paraclete, which is just a slightly anglicized form of the Greek word for Counselor but is often considered the name of the third person of the Trinity, the Holy Spirit) UU to replace the Berserker and serve a very different purpose. It is basically a defensive only monk with only 1 base strength but 2 Spirit Affinity. It also comes with all the spirit promotions. In my version, Spirit III has a second spell (I go back and forth between the names Comfort, Allay, and Assuage) which removes the Crazed, Enraged, and Burning Blood promotions from nearby units, and in some versions can also deal uncapped holy damage to rage-based demons like Chaos Marauders, Iras, the Avatar of Wrath, and Odio.


I often give Chalid access to the Spirit sphere too. The Sun sphere often seems like a compromise position between Law and Spirit (it forgives like Spirit, but is very strict about it and like Law does not forget past wrongs), so it would make sense for him to use Spirit if he can use Law.

I always give Aureales perfect sight (letting them see invisible units), plus let them target assassins, shadows, and assassin-like heroes in stacks of stronger units and defend first against them.


I'd support the Nature changes. Guardian Vines ought to be a permanent summon starting with Guardsman, Woodsman I, Woodsman II, and Vulnerable to Fire. It could perhaps use a little Poison strength as well as Nature affinity. I also tend to think that the Druid's Entangle spell ought to be moved to the Guardian Vines. Druids could still use it, but less directly. I like allowing Druids to access Nature, Life, and Creation spells, but need the right mana to get any level of those.


I don't mind Inspiration, but thematically it would fit better in the Creation sphere. I used to have it as Creation II (where I made the building provide a slot for every specialist, boosted both research and culture, and increased the GP point rate) in my version, but did not care for the way I'd implemented Avarice (the mind I spell I made to replace it) so I undid that.

For Creation I I often add a requires caster building that adds free food as well as some health and food storage ability.

For Creation III I like having a spell that can cause a random great person to be born in a random civ's random city. I also like a second spell that can create a random resource on the caster's tile, but will usually fail. After all, the lore says that the Creation sphere is the most potent form of magic when it works, but is also the least reliable.

It might be thematically better for Domination to have a chance of giving out the Crazed promotion to the target, caster, and even units nearby rather than removing Mind III. Mind Magic did drive Perpentach mad. (With my added Spirit III spell this would not have to be permanent though.)


It might be nice for Life spell spheres to allow access to the Medic promotions.

Force should be mostly about Balance and enforcing the consensus reality by combating powerful magics that distort it. I like Force I to be Temporance, which gives a promotion of the same name that gives Holy and Unholy resistance. It might be nice for Force to have one summon, the Runewyn. From the Bestiary we see that these angels of Dagda should be completely magic immune and should be able to destroy magic with a touch. I'm thinking they would have Flying, Magic Immune, the ability to target arcane units (archmages in particular) in stacks of stronger units, and a python call that lets them strip their enemies of magic buffs, spell spheres, and even channeling promotions even when they lose a battle.

 

[ExMachina]

I really don't see Einherjar as fitting the Spirit sphere. I see no connections between Sirona and Valhalla. We know for a fact however that the Valkyries (which in Norse mythology are sent to bring the Einherjar to Valhalla and prepare them for Ragnorok) in FfH are angels of Junil.

Well, I know I'm not as familiar with FfH lore as you are, but these are the things that come to mind when I think of the Spirit sphere:

-Elohim (monks, protectors of holy sites, defensive, working against demons/Armageddon, closely connected to angels [special bonus from that angelic procession event])
-Hope/Inspiration/Wisdom
-Spirit Guide (i.e. the spirits of the slain coming back to help the living, very similar to the Einherjar)

A holy guardian spirit/angel that comes back to protect humanity seems to fit Spirit's theme very well in my opinion; it's basically a more martial version of Spirit Guide (though maybe the flavor should be different from Einherjar). Though if the Law sphere is more of a Justice/Junil type thing, I can see the Einherjar also fitting very well in Law. But the Calabim (and all other Evil civs) shouldn't start with Law mana, if that's the case. Maybe give them Mind or Death mana instead.

 

[[to_xp]Gekko]

so how do people feel about MC's take on Dimensional mana/spells? that "one mana type is missing" feeling is killing me