Master of Myrror Fantasy Mod 2.0

[Drift]

Be assured, pedia will be refined. Current entries are largely placeholders. About the Giant/Black Spider... Whoops. Will fix.

Popheads will also be fixed, civ color included. I got frustated with the whole pophead thing with available colors not fitting undead and demons and civ color giving me continuous palette problems so I just removed it and decided to revisit the whole thing at a later point. Pedit also stopped working for me (overflow error each time I start it up). Just hang in there, I'm aware of the problems it has.

 

[Cabbit]

Originally posted by ChaosLord
What about Apprentice units for each of the 4 magic types that you can upgrade? IE, if you played as Death you'd be able to build 1st Level Apprentices of Death, then various tech advances would allow upgrading the Apprentices.

I think done like this the AI would use them properly. This would be a good way to represent the heros in MoM, since they would be stronger then normal units. With a high cost there shouldn't be a huge number of them and it'd add flavor to the various magic types.

What about upgradable Kings? (I think someone suggested this earlier) You could have 4 different King types that upgrade, and have the special abilities ChaosLord suggested. It would also be possible to use mass regicide so you can use your units a little bit w/ out worrying they will die. The "official" civ 3 team felt good enough about the AI's ussage of the feature to include such Kings in Sengoku so, ostensibly, the AI should use the kings.

 

[mrtn]

I've started to mod the WH one by turning the civ colours blue, so I later can easily give the orcs civ colours. You can wait with starting to mod yours til I finish mine, if you find it useful.
Will doing this I found a cool thing with RGB values I didn't know before.
RGB (95,163,15) is a green. If you shift the numbers "to the right", to (15, 95, 163) you get a "similar" blue. And I suppose (by conjecture) that if you shift it "to the left" you get a red colour. Cool, ain't?

 

[ChaosLord]

@Drift

Now that you mention it, having a wonder or even the Palace producing them every X number of turns would be better. AI wouldn't build too many, and would have the oppurtunity to use them just as much as the player.

Also, I though of some more abilities. Give the Life mage the ability to build barricades(call it Shield/Barrier/etc..) and restrict it to Life mages only. Then for Nature, give them the ability to plant forests.

@Cabbit

The AI actually doesn't use its King units at all, they sit in the cities until they die. Not even retreating when the city is about to fall. Plus not everyone plays regicide, so I think it'd be better for them to be regular units so they can play a part in all games.

 

[embryodead]

Some comments from my sister, whose been playing your mod a lot lately. I agree with her fully though
- bears do not live in swamps
- you won't find any fish in swamps neither. in civ3 there are marshes, which are something completly different.
- boars live in forested areas, be it a forest or swamp, but not a grassland!
(that's not something unimportant, mind you. It really looks strange for me to see bears in swamps...)
- we both really think that using Legolas as Freya (and also.. you know what ) looks horrible... I don't understand your stubborness about original civ3 leaderheads. A plain Isabella will look a tad better as Freya than Legolas...

ChaosLord is right unfortunately... AI is stupid. Sengoku scenario isn't a good example, because AI doesn't use his kings there neither, and the whole thing is only in favor of human player, who can conquer the whole island with his Shogun. An argument against the whole hero-kings idea

 

[Drift]

Originally posted by embryodead
- bears do not live in swamps
- you won't find any fish in swamps neither. in civ3 there are marshes, which are something completly different.
- boars live in forested areas, be it a forest or swamp, but not a grassland!

You and your sister are right. To be honest, resources (apart form race resources and mana nodes) are something I haven't really paid attention to and their current state is a bit embarrassing (although, if I'm not badly mistaken, Finnish bears do prowl the swamps also ) I did intend to rework the natural resources for the beta, but never got around to do it. I'll put it on my list for the next big patch.

- we both really think that using Legolas as Freya (and also.. you know what ) looks horrible... I don't understand your stubborness about original civ3 leaderheads. A plain Isabella will look a tad better as Freya than Legolas...

Right again. I've been having similar thoughts myself lately. Sween's elf is also of low graphical quality. The model and animations are top notch, but the quality is strangely low. As for using Firaxis leaderheads... I know I'm being stubborn, but it's just that they hold a very strong association to their role in the epic game. I'll try work out something. (Maybe even use a Firaxis leaderhead )

The upgradeable heroes thing is definitely interesting, but it's something to be considered at a later point in development. I'll be sure to come back here and revisit all these suggestions then.

Thanks to everyone for the feedback!

 

[Drift]

I made new popheads.pcx based on mrtn's civ colored fantasy population heads. They have civ colors and are better quality. Undead also got new look - dead elves with a vampiric touch. Female human also has different graphics.

E.D, I'm still interested in those skeleton popheads if you are willing to do them, but there's no rush.

To use these popheads, just replace the popHeads.pcx in Civ3\Conquests\Scenarios\MoM\Art\SmallHeads\ with this new one. Hope you like them. I know I think they are better than the old ones.

Here's a preview of them:

Edit: I removed the download, new version few posts down. Male demon is now same color with the female (reddish brown)

 

[aaglo]

In Finland bears do live in swamps too, because they don't have no place else to go (approx 60% of the land-area of Finland is basically swamp )

 

[embryodead]

This is not Finland

 

[Drift]

I rushed those popheads a bit too much. That pork-pink color of chaos dude is horrible. I can't stand the idea of it being online.

Here's a better one. I did some other small fixes too.

 

[Drift]

Here's the new setup of mages:

- Sss'ra replaced Kali as a chaos mage.
- Tlaloc took Sss'ra's place as a nature mage. (Original Tlaloc was death + nature and I like my current death mages a lot.) I'm looking for possible replacement graphics for Montezuma, but he'll do for now.
- Nature mage Ariel (elf with a green dress and wings) was renamed Freya.
- Old Freya (Legolas) was removed and replaced with Ariel. Theodora is ok although I would've given her a white robe. However, I can't upload C3C content with such small modifications.

I took a few steps towards being more faithful to old Master of Magic. I would also like to replace Beorn as he isn't from Master of Magic and looks bad. Also, as good as Sween's Sauron is, I'm looking for a replacement.

I've got a lot of the next patch done:
- New unit, Wyvern rider makes its appearance as a 6.3.3 Chaos unit. It's a Chaos Knight upgrade.
- Doom Drake makes a return as a unit spawned by a new Drake Mastery great spell.
- Kinboat's new saurus units replace two of the three skinks from Lizardmen and aaglo's updated Cog and Siege Cannon graphics are in. I also hope embryodead gets those giants done soon so I can include them - I would really like to get rid of those ugly placeholders.
- Monolith was moved into death magic branch and obelisk into nature magic branch. Monolith also received a 50% effectiveness cut.
- Magic techs don't require techs from other branches (for example, Chaos Magic IV requires just Chaos Magic III, not also Life-, Death- and Nature magics II) Hope this won't wreck tech balance.
- Civilopedia has been somewhat updated. For example, when a unit or building is mentioned, there should be a link to that building/unit.
- Resources have been reworked. Bears live in Forests and Ancient Forests. Boars live in Forests and Swamps. New resource Cattle roams grasslands and plains. Seals make an appearance to tundra. Fish and whales were added to coasts and seas just like they have always been meant to. There's no longer any fish in swamps.
- Techboxes have a new lighter color making it easier to see the texts.
- New popheads are naturally in.
- Enchanted spring palette problem is gone, resources have correct icons. All units have correct icons.
- I couldn't figure out a good way to make the ocean more distinct from sea - technical difficulties. Sorry.

I continue to work with stuff while waiting for those giants. (two of them were made about a week ago so it can't be long. ) I'd like to make this patch as finished as possible, so even if the giants appear today, it could take a few days before I release this.

What do you people think of the changes? New mages in particular? I've been against using Firaxis leaderheads, but I have to admit that I really like Theodora-Ariel. Montezuma I'm not that keen on. Also, is there anything I've missed. I've gone through this thread and fixed / tried to fix everything that has been mentioned.

 

[Nibble]

Drift,

Glad to see you've put the Doom Drake back in. Also, I'm curious to see how that new siege unit is goint to play.

BTW if you need help with Civilopedia text input, I would be glad to help.

 

[Drift]

Originally posted by Nibble
Also, I'm curious to see how that new siege unit is goint to play.

Actually, the siege unit is just a graphical update, it's still the highest bombardment unit of the game and exclusive to chaos mages. Aaglo updated some of his older units and I decided to include the upgrades in the patch.

BTW if you need help with Civilopedia text input, I would be glad to help.

Thanks. I think I have this under control right now, but I'll be sure to ask if I ever need help with it.

 

[Nibble]

Great! Looking forward to the new patch with high anticipation. Not looking forward to days on end without sleep!

Keep it coming!

 

[mrtn]

I have no idea if Theodora fits as Ariel or not, as I never played the original, but I'm happy you gave up your stiff necked resistance against Firaxis heads.

Why do you have seals in tundra? Seals are sea creatures, you know. Put them in coast instead, if you want them. Tundra could have reindeer or musk ox instead. Or gold (Alaska, for instance).

 

[Drift]

Originally posted by mrtn
I have no idea if Theodora fits as Ariel or not, as I never played the original, but I'm happy you gave up your stiff necked resistance against Firaxis heads.

I attached a sketch of Ariel from a great site with concept sketches from Master of Magic. It's not a match, but it's close enough.

As for my neck loosening up, you're unfortunately wrong. My neck has been really stiff lately, must've been sitting too much in this crappy computer chair or something.

Why do you have seals in tundra? Seals are sea creatures, you know. Put them in coast instead, if you want them. Tundra could have reindeer or musk ox instead. Or gold (Alaska, for instance).

Hmm. Well, I put them in tundra because... I don't know really. The seal in the resource is lying around so it can't be placed on water. Guess I was unconsciously treating tundra more as a sea of ice kinda thing. Pity, I liked those little seals lying around, they were kinda cute. I'll come up with something else.

Here's that Ariel sketch:

 

[The Last Conformist]

Too bad you can't restrict land resources to tiles next to water.

Looking forward to the next patch.

 

[Drift]

The next patch will be postponed a bit. I've been taking time off from modding and focusing on my real life lately and now I'm going to Lapland for a skiing trip. I'll try to wrap up the patch after I come back (it's a one week trip).

 

[tjedge1]

Have a good trip! A safe trip, too.

 

[Drift]

Originally posted by tjedge1
A safe trip, too.

Yes, hopefully. It's something of a current topic at the moment as last night, 24 people were killed when a bus bound for Lapland collided with a truck in central Finland. It was so slippery that the rescue teams had trouble walking on the road.

All victims were young people going skiing to Lapland.