Diversify magic a little.

[Guybrush!]

Well I have had a few ideas to diversify summons a bit.

-Water elementals-
Should function as some kind of sea transport, would need an increased duration, or permanent or something like that.

-Earth elementals-
I think I have heard this idea before, but I can't remember where. Anyway, add a random terrain feature called 'Stones' or somesuch, and cities / improvements cannot be built on it, and it increases hammers in the tile by 1. And then give earth elementals the ability to turn into Stones and change them back when enemies approach.

-Auraelis (however it is spelt)
Get rid of the auraelis, and replace it with another spell, called Solar Beam. This would be a direct damage spell with 2 squares range that targets the biggest stack in range. It would require a turn of charging before casting. (As in, I click solar beam, caster cannot move and next turn it fires). This would synergize with blinding light aswell. Not sure how much damage, but perhaps give it no damage cap (so it can, rarely, kill untis?).

-Air elementals-
Give them auto pillage. Think of them like a tornado, you use them to plow through improvements.

Not sure about changing the Law and Entropy summons, out of ideas.

Keep fire elementals as is though, the collateral damage makes them different enough.

Also, give summons the 'Expendable' promotion, which increases chance to defend the stack. This idea has been brought up before, I think it was Warkirby (not quite sure though...)

Anyhoo, my ideas any good?

 

[MagisterCultuum]

In my version, Water Elementals can carry Naval units as cargo, Earth Elementals have a change to cause earthquakes when they die, Aurleales target recon units (and assassins, Alazkan the Assassin, Rathaus, etc. specifically) in stacks of stronger units and have Perfect Sight, Air Elementals autopilage, Hosts of the Einherjar start with Valor and Guardsman, and Pit Beasts start with Cannibalize.

 

[WarKirby]

-Auraelis (however it is spelt)
Get rid of the auraelis, and replace it with another spell, called Solar Beam. This would be a direct damage spell with 2 squares range that targets the biggest stack in range. It would require a turn of charging before casting. (As in, I click solar beam, caster cannot move and next turn it fires). This would synergize with blinding light aswell. Not sure how much damage, but perhaps give it no damage cap (so it can, rarely, kill untis?).

Venusaur used Solar Beam !

 

[Tasunke]

So did Laprass if you were smart with her

 

[PPQ_Purple]

I like the concept but please don't name it solar beam.
It sounds like something from a Megamen X game.

 

[Vehem]

Not sure how much damage, but perhaps give it no damage cap (so it can, rarely, kill untis?).

Direct damage with no cap vs stacks is bad. There is no "rarely" - just "slowly". Slowly becomes quickly if you throw a few other stack-damage spells at it first. The result becomes that a few units can kill an unlimited number of stacked opposing units. Auric has that ability (and rightly so), but giving it to a summonable/expendable unit doesn't seem a good plan.

 

[Earthling]

Yeah, I'm rather opposed to high damage caps (or low, however you call it I oppose being able to redline units to like 20% HP) on stack attacks. In fact I'm kinda a stickler against blanket stack-attacking magic in general - sure, it makes for easy pickings as a human against the AI but isn't exactly balanced.

I always thought Earth elementals really should be used more defensively- giving them Guardsmen isn't exactly right (fits perfectly with Law II), but they should have an increased chance to defend against random units.

Water elementals are already quite good, splitting when they die - they pretty much guarantee a kill particularly against individual units. Fire are also quite good with their Collateral too. I'd agree Air elementals are kinda weak, pillaging similar to the FF raiders would be great, and Aurealis can use a bonus too but I'd rather not have Sun III be a direct damage spell, given all the other powers like Crown of Brilliance along similar lines.

 

[WarKirby]

Personally, I think a cap on the number of targetable units, rather than on the damage you can do, would be preferable.

It doesn't seem fair that one spell can hit everything in a vast army, nor that an enemy mysteriously becomes immune to magic when wounded. I'd like to see all spells with no overall damage caps (and thus able to kill), but limited instead in how much they can do per hit, and how many targets they can hit at once.

If ring of Flames could kill, but could only hit 4 max units at once, it wouldn't be too bad. Since the stronger undamaged units would always be coming out to take hits for the weaker, injured ones. Oh, and of course, units with high magic resistance should always stand in the blast and take hits first. I think it would be a lot better than being able to do up to 40% to everything within the radius, whether it's 5 or 5000 units.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

Yes, something analogous to the <iCollateralDamageMaxUnits> tag but for spells would be good.

 

[Guybrush!]

I agree about the cap on untis you can hit, would be alot more balanced.