Limiting Magic

[Tarquelne]

I tend to win games with a Mage SoD. Or two. It may not be much of an issue in MP, but the AI seems to have real trouble coping. So I've made some changes that I hope limit the power of magic while keeping it fun.

I'm not proposing WM adopt these changes, btw - though that'd save me trouble every patch - I just want to discuss it.

Here's what I've got so far.

1) A nerf to the level 2 Arcane damage spells, including summonings. For direct-damage spells, generally 1/2. For summonings, usually -1 strength and no boni from mana. But it varies.

2) Can't build an adept if unless you've got more mana sources than the number of adepts + mages. Arcane leaders get 1 extra. (I might make more expensive or remove some mana-source buildings. And House Carnath(sp?) may be a problem.)

3) Dispel doesn't reset mana nodes. So no more getting a Water, Sun, and Enchantment node just long enough to make a couple of terraformers and an Enchanter. You'll be stuck with what you capture or the WM-gods provide, and any node you build will be a real commitment.

I may have to limit Priests, too, to fully nerf magic in the way I desire. (Any thoughts?) Mages being tied to mana nodes feels right. But I'm not sure what'd work for Priests. Population? # of cities following the state religion?

 

[Calavente]

maybe instead you can just mod so that the AI gets an automatic "magic resistance" promotion for every unit at your usual difficulty level (it should be somewhere in the xml no?). That would reduce the OP of magic in your games.
IMO, the Ai using magic and assassins, especially in WM is damaging enough without nerfing the magic abilities.

1) : may be ok, but IMO, shadowwalk and blur are much more damaging than maelstorm, that one being not so powerful (max 30%dmg), reducing it may be a bit much. while Death II(specters) migth be better without the affinity and 1 more death. on the other hand, tierIII summons and entropyIII are not so strong if you consider the investment (mana node + archmage + xp +...etc). Last, maybe emy's and chalid's spells could be downgraded.

2) that would be a bit of a strong nerf. Maybe add +1 adept/mage per mage guild, +2 for catacomb librarus, +3 for arcane leaders. (+ have archmage/lich not counting fas they are already limited in number)
I mean, the number of mana sources is really luck dependant, and it would mean that an efficient arcane leader would be someone who goes into religion before going for arcane so as to try to get 2-3 religions shrines to get 2-3 more mana sources.

3) Dispel is huge. It is really important IMO. I totally disagree with it. It would mean that the tower victory is back to being almost a conquest victory.
IMO, it would be better to focus on making it a hard choice to lose a mana node (ex +1:happy: for enchantment mana) or to keep it. Maybe make it so dispell takes many turns to cast, or that it creats an unipllageable improvement, giving +1:angry: in nearby cities, upgrading in 10-20turns into a pillageable improvement. thus dispelling a node and rebuilding on on top of it would take 5-25 turns + construction time instead of just the construction time.

For priests you can tie it to
1 per temple of state religion + 2-3 for state religion's shrine
+ bonus for some wonders that are priest oriented + 1-2 per level of the altar ?
maybe 1-2 per incense ressource ?

 

[Tarquelne]

maybe instead you can just mod so that the AI gets an automatic "magic resistance" promotion for every unit at your usual difficulty level (it should be somewhere in the xml no?).

I think there may actually be a global setting that'd be easy to change. It's worth thinking about.

OTOH...

1) : may be ok, but IMO, shadowwalk and blur are much more damaging than maelstorm, that one being not so powerful (max 30%dmg),

... the real problem for me seems to involve the number of mages, primarily because of the instant armies available with the level 2 summoning spells. I'm not as worried about spells like shadowwalk because the AI seems to do a decent job with them, and because the number of mages doesn't matter much - multiple shadowwalks, for example, aren't cumulative. With those spells the mages are just acting as a force multiplier rather than nearly replacing the other units.

...the number of mana sources is really luck dependant...

Luck or conquest, yeah. I want to keep mage numbers fairly low, but allowing builder/peaceful ways to increase the # sounds like a good idea.

3) Dispel is huge. It is really important IMO. I totally disagree with it. It would mean that the tower victory is back to being almost a conquest victory.

I can see that, but I've never found Tower victory satisfying anyway.

This is actually my favorite alteration. Well, I guess I should say best tested: I've often played this way for quite awhile. It probably just comes down to personal taste: Node-flipping has always struck me as "gamey." I'd rather have to work with what I'm given. (Heck, in the past I've even gone so far as to restrict civs to 5 "civ appropriate" mana types.)

Limiting changing mana by requiring a long delay might work given #1: If you've only got a few mages having one spend 30 turns flipping a node is a significant sacrifice.

For priests you can tie it to
1 per temple of state religion + 2-3 for state religion's shrine
+ bonus for some wonders that are priest oriented + 1-2 per level of the altar ?
maybe 1-2 per incense ressource ?

Good ideas.

 

[tesb]

1) A nerf to the level 2 Arcane damage spells, including summonings. For direct-damage spells, generally 1/2. For summonings, usually -1 strength and no boni from mana. But it varies.

total disagreement here. this means you just need more mages, i would rather make the mages weaker and more expensive, maybe make adepts 2/2, mages 3/3 and archmages 4/4. So it is their spells and not the mages themselves who do the work.
Also keep in mind that temporary summons do not gain experience, a permanent unit with a comparable strength is always better, since it has the ability to gain in strength over time via training or combat. an adept costs 90 while a champion costs 120 and an adept is a weak 3/3 unit with next to no combat capabilities and to make him worthwhile you have to spend money on him to upgrade him to a mage. this also costs you more time since you have to wait for the experience to accumulate while a champion is ready from the start.

i make a counter proposal:
-reduce the strength of adepts/mages/archmages like above (to 2/2 3/3 4/4 respectively)
-instead of gaining the promotion combat I to V they gain a promotion that only increases their spell power but not their combat strength
-summons take 1 turn (or possible more, depending on the spell) to cast, so you have to plan ahead on where to summon. it would put a greater emphasis on summons with a faster movement and rarely used promotion that increase the movement of summons

==> mages will have a more fleshed out role especially in the beginning where adepts are nearly as strong as axemen, also they are even more prone to fall victims to assassins.

2) Can't build an adept if unless you've got more mana sources than the number of adepts + mages. Arcane leaders get 1 extra. (I might make more expensive or remove some mana-source buildings. And House Carnath(sp?) may be a problem.)

so you made the number of mages dependent on the number of mana nodes? i don't know if i like hard capping i rather see the mages more balanced. Are you sure that the stack of mages is so much stronger then a stack of normal units in which you poured the same amount recourses? i my games a stack of a few mages to offer support spells along with a few priests and huge amount normal units lead by a powerful hero is much more threatening then a mage only stack.

on point 3: total disagreement again, i don't like to have possibilities taken away from me, however i could see point 2 and 3 as a game option.

 

[Tarquelne]

i would rather make the mages weaker and more expensive,

I've tried that before - not really satisfying. And I think it hurts the AI far more than the human, in that I'll know to focus more hammers on Adepts.

maybe make adepts 2/2, mages 3/3 and archmages 4/4. So it is their spells and not the mages themselves who do the work.

It could help, but I think their spells are already what do by far the most work.

Also keep in mind that temporary summons do not gain experience, a permanent unit with a comparable strength is always better, since it has the ability to gain in strength over time via training or combat. an adept costs 90 while a champion costs 120

Yes.... but you left something major out of your analysis: The cost per turn of a summoned unit. And that's where I think the AI falls down: It can't figure out how to win a war of attrition with the stack of mages 2 or 3 tiles away from its own stack.

-summons take 1 turn (or possible more, depending on the spell) to cast,

I considered something like that. If nothing else, I'm pretty sure it'd hurt the AI far more than a human player. A human will know to sync mage summons to attacks, and will take the proper care in placing the summoning mage.

Are you sure that the stack of mages is so much stronger then a stack of normal units in which you poured the same amount recourses?

Yes. In effect, given the AI's difficulty with mages.

on point 3: total disagreement again, i don't like to have possibilities taken away from me, however i could see point 2 and 3 as a game option.

Well, sure. Just keep in mind I'm not trying to get this adopted as a WM feature, and that if the game were just about having possibilities then opening the WB wouldn't be a "cheat."

 

[tesb]

Yes.... but you left something major out of your analysis: The cost per turn of a summoned unit. And that's where I think the AI falls down: It can't figure out how to win a war of attrition with the stack of mages 2 or 3 tiles away from its own stack.

how can the ai fail in a war of attrition, it has so many bonuses it is not even funny to see how much units their empire can support compared to the player.
I see your post in a different light now however, it is not that mages are not properly balanced but rather that the ai has a poor handling of them. i don't see your issues with offensive magic however the ai makes use of those spells too.

if you mostly have issues with the summons why not change the summoning system altogether:
-make summons disable the caster from moving
-you can only summon in your cities
-if the summon is killed the caster is free to move again and do stuff like casting spells

since all summons would be permanent the old permanent summons would take a bit longer time to cast but not interfere with the casters ability to move and cast spells.

these are minor xml changes that the ai should easily adopt to and you will no longer have an army of mages that can summon hordes of units out of nowhere.

 

[Valkrionn]

Or implement a global/national 'mana pool'...

Spells cost a certain amount of mana to cast, limiting the number each civ can use in a turn.

Summons are all permanent, but take a certain amount of mana as upkeep. Large initial cost, constant perturn drain, killed off if there isn't enough mana available for them.

Only X mana regenerates each turn, increased by certain buildings/resources (maybe even by untyped mana? Cost/benefit for gaining access to spells or leaving the mana unimproved).

Mana can only be accumulated to a cap of Y (a cap keeps a civ like, say, the Doviello, from becoming arcane beasts after suddenly gaining mages when they capture the Amurites. Without it, they'd have massive amounts accumulated), affected by buildings/traits/etc.


Tarq may recognize this idea.

 

[Tarquelne]

how can the ai fail in a war of attrition, it has so many bonuses it is not even funny to see how much units their empire can support compared to the player.

It fails when you expend 0 built units killing off its units.

I see your post in a different light now however, it is not that mages are not properly balanced but rather that the ai has a poor handling of them. i don't see your issues with offensive magic however the ai makes use of those spells too.

Not quite. It's more about how the AI defends against mages than how it uses them offensively.

if you mostly have issues with the summons why not change the summoning system altogether:
....
these are minor xml changes that the ai should easily adopt to and you will no longer have an army of mages that can summon hordes of units out of nowhere.

Two reasons:

1) I'm skeptical about how well the AI would adapt.
2) The other changes were simpler to make, not to mention I'd already thought of them.

Nevertheless, I'm pretty tempted by a major change to the summons along the lines you describe. A greater difference between mages with direct-damage spells and summoners would be nice.

What's the xml to keep a caster immobile while the summons is alive?

 

[Tarquelne]

Tarq may recognize this idea.

It's from the classic 1951 film "The African Queen" with Humphery Bogart and Katherine Hepburn, directed by John Houston and from a novel by C.S. Forrester?

No, I'm thinking about the bit with the leeches for some reason.


I'd be willing to try it if someone else did all the work.


I was thinking about other games, and if I had my druthers I think I'd go for a system where mage spells have unlimited range - in fact the mages may not even appear on the map. (They'd be like Great People, perhaps?) I think such a system tends to be easier on the AI, it could fit well with both a pool system and a system with far fewer but much more powerful (and thus theoretically more interesting) mages.

 

[Valkrionn]

It's from the classic 1951 film "The African Queen" with Humphery Bogart and Katherine Hepburn, directed by John Houston and from a novel by C.S. Forrester?

No, I'm thinking about the bit with the leeches for some reason.


I'd be willing to try it if someone else did all the work.


I was thinking about other games, and if I had my druthers I think I'd go for a system where mage spells have unlimited range - in fact the mages may not even appear on the map. (They'd be like Great People, perhaps?) I think such a system tends to be easier on the AI, it could fit well with both a pool system and a system with far fewer but much more powerful (and thus theoretically more interesting) mages.

There's a certain feature coming in RifE which the AI handles fairly well, and would allow a mechanic like you described... Hadn't considered using it to that extreme, though.

 

[tesb]

Not quite. It's more about how the AI defends against mages than how it uses them offensively.

maybe add a counterspell mechanic? if you (or the ai) wants to cast a spell and there is an enemy mage nearby that did not cast a spell in his turn, the spell has a change to fail. this change is decreased by by the level discrepancy between the two casters or just make the ai for assassins better.

What's the xml to keep a caster immobile while the summons is alive?

add promotion held when the spell is casted? ..wait no that does not cut it
i don't know. spehi to the rescue i guess?

It fails when you expend 0 built units killing off its units.

summons are weak compared to regular military units (i.e. ghosts to champions, skeletons to axemen) so there is the distinct side effect of feeding xp to the enemy if you don't have enough summons. you also have to build the mage in first place. mages are prone to fall victims to assassins (if only the ai would handle units with the marksmen promotion better).

 

[tesb]

Or implement a global/national 'mana pool'...

Spells cost a certain amount of mana to cast, limiting the number each civ can use in a turn.

Summons are all permanent, but take a certain amount of mana as upkeep. Large initial cost, constant perturn drain, killed off if there isn't enough mana available for them.

Only X mana regenerates each turn, increased by certain buildings/resources (maybe even by untyped mana? Cost/benefit for gaining access to spells or leaving the mana unimproved).

Mana can only be accumulated to a cap of Y (a cap keeps a civ like, say, the Doviello, from becoming arcane beasts after suddenly gaining mages when they capture the Amurites. Without it, they'd have massive amounts accumulated), affected by buildings/traits/etc.


Tarq may recognize this idea.

that is the system used in many games for example age of wonders, i do like it you could even include enchantments in it

 

[Tarquelne]

expend 0 units killing ai units...

summons are weak compared to regular military units (i.e. ghosts to champions, skeletons to axemen) so there is the distinct side effect of feeding xp to the enemy

Yeah, but...

if you don't have enough summons.

If you do, the AI is toast. (A few AoE direct-damage spells also go a long way toward bringing defenders within reach of summoned attackers.)
and...

(if only the ai would handle units with the marksmen promotion better).

Quite.

The AI also won't pursue locally poor exchange to kill off the (expensive, long-growing) mages, even if it's going to lose it's city or units anyway. Or bulk out defenders with cheap, weak units to help absorb attacks.

Maybe if the AI saw mages as a much greater threat it'd allocate more defenders to the vicinity of enemy mages. But I'd rather fiddle with limiting magic than trying to make the AI smarter. (AI coding, like messing with the .dll, is something I avoid.)

 

[tesb]

is it possible to implement a second resource that works like gold and certain units/promotion and spells would use this recourse and mana nodes would generate it? i think changing to such a system is the best way to go. this won't make the ai better but you have to make decisions on what buffs/spells/summons you use. i think it will add a great strategic depth to the game. you would have gold to handle research/normal units and mana to handle magic. for example summons would cost minor upfront mana but high upkeep, buffs would cost no mana to cast and have low upkeep while offensie spells would have a normal to high mana cost.

if someone would make such a resource with upkeep tags in the xmls i would mod this

@tarquelne i agree with your analysis i just would like to see a better fix then in the op


edit:
how about a system where each adept has 1 each mage 2 and an archmage 3 manapoints (the difference to above suggestion is that this is a not a global resoucre but based on the unit). each spell would cost a certain amount of mana and the manapool of the unit would slowly regenerate based on mananodes and level of the caster. maybe set the numbers a bit higher for more diverse balancing. I volunteer for xml work and art work if someone is willing to make the python changes.

 

[Earthling]

I think Dispell could do well as Metamagic III instead of 2 in any version of FfH. Never really liked the Djinn summon much, it could easily be pushed back to a weaker tier two summon or some other appropriate spell. Though as far as getting the AI to cope with magic, it simply won't happen and is a balancing factor on difficulty anyway. If magic is nerfed then reducing free experience bonuses and stuff to the AI's massive regular military stacks would be in order.

 

[Valkrionn]

is it possible to implement a second resource that works like gold and certain units/promotion and spells would use this recourse and mana nodes would generate it? i think changing to such a system is the best way to go. this won't make the ai better but you have to make decisions on what buffs/spells/summons you use. i think it will add a great strategic depth to the game. you would have gold to handle research/normal units and mana to handle magic. for example summons would cost minor upfront mana but high upkeep, buffs would cost no mana to cast and have low upkeep while offensie spells would have a normal to high mana cost.

if someone would make such a resource with upkeep tags in the xmls i would mod this

@tarquelne i agree with your analysis i just would like to see a better fix then in the op


edit:
how about a system where each adept has 1 each mage 2 and an archmage 3 manapoints (the difference to above suggestion is that this is a not a global resoucre but based on the unit). each spell would cost a certain amount of mana and the manapool of the unit would slowly regenerate based on mananodes and level of the caster. maybe set the numbers a bit higher for more diverse balancing. I volunteer for xml work and art work if someone is willing to make the python changes.

By a 'second resource', I assume you mean a new yield on tiles? Unfortunately, that display seems to be hardcoded; Opera tried something along those lines before, can't display a 4th yield.

Which is why my version is just from buildings/improvements/etc.

A system that is unit based would work too, I just don't like it as much.

Either way, it wouldn't be possible via python; needs to be in the DLL.

 

[tesb]

no it would not be a fourth yield. in the top left corner you can see gold, research and culture. just make an other entry for a national global mana pool that every spell would draw from. the amount of mananodes would define the income. the actual cost of the spells could be influenced by caster level, the spell itself, certain traits, religions etc.

 

[Valkrionn]

no it would not be a fourth yield. in the top left corner you can see gold, research and culture. just make an other entry for a national global mana pool that every spell would draw from. the amount of mananodes would define the income. the actual cost of the spells could be influenced by caster level, the spell itself, certain traits, religions etc.

Oh. A new commerce, then. Or just a new tracking variable, like the amount of gold you actually have?

Either way, should be possible. An extra commerce was added in BtS, so even if you can't add new ones (should be able to, only issue with yields was displaying it accurately), you could rename/change the icon of Espionage. For the second... VERY easy.

Just so you know, you're describing exactly what I had meant at this point. Still requires DLL work, however, and probably a lot of it to get it to work well.

 

[tesb]

i just realized i posted your idea a second time

i should read more carefully:

Or implement a global/national 'mana pool'...

Spells cost a certain amount of mana to cast, limiting the number each civ can use in a turn.

Summons are all permanent, but take a certain amount of mana as upkeep. Large initial cost, constant perturn drain, killed off if there isn't enough mana available for them.

Only X mana regenerates each turn, increased by certain buildings/resources (maybe even by untyped mana? Cost/benefit for gaining access to spells or leaving the mana unimproved).

Mana can only be accumulated to a cap of Y (a cap keeps a civ like, say, the Doviello, from becoming arcane beasts after suddenly gaining mages when they capture the Amurites. Without it, they'd have massive amounts accumulated), affected by buildings/traits/etc.

is it possible to implement a second resource that works like gold and certain units/promotion and spells would use this recourse and mana nodes would generate it? i think changing to such a system is the best way to go. this won't make the ai better but you have to make decisions on what buffs/spells/summons you use. i think it will add a great strategic depth to the game. you would have gold to handle research/normal units and mana to handle magic. for example summons would cost minor upfront mana but high upkeep, buffs would cost no mana to cast and have low upkeep while offensie spells would have a normal to high mana cost.

my bad

 

[Valkrionn]

To be fair, it's not my idea. First proposed in the FF team forum, a few months ago.