Please STOP nerfing magic!!

[Yaotzin]

The Archmage's has Empowered 5 and moves 4 squares before exploding. I guess I find it the equivalent of saying that an Axeman's Bronze weapon should give him a greater benefit than a warriors. When in reality, the axemen is simply able to use the stronger Iron Weapons as well.

A brand new mage is only 2-4 (depending on number of nodes) promotions off Empowered 5 move 4 fireballs though. Also, once you have Combat V and Spell Extension 2, that's it. You can't improve the spells any more. Other units get lots of promotions, combat, drill, shock, anti demon stuff, hill/forest defense, and so on. Mages just become more versatile, which is pretty much useless, since you can just build more to cast other spells. I'd really like to see two things:

1) Archmages casting the same spell are inherently better at it. Is at least partly already the case depending how that -spell resist from channeling works. I think the difference should be fairly significant though.
2) More promotions that aren't spells. Mages get what, Combat, Spell extension, and mobility? This means that a fresh Archmage is little different to a 100xp Archmage, because they both have pretty much all the promotions they need, and there's nothing more.
3) Ability to specialise. I'd like to be able to make Archmages that are really good at throwing fireballs, but kinda suck at anything else. Or good at summoning, or whatever. Obviously this means more promotions, so it ties into 2.

 

[Gelvan]

Please STOP nerfing magic!!

absolutely.

Beginn to INCREASE the strength of magic. If this makes it to easy for you to play against AI: increase difficulty level. It's "complicated" enough to get tier 2 spells anyway compared to "build-axeman-build-axeman-build-axeman" so... just make magic STRONG.

in MP this doesn't matter, because everyone has the same strength.
in SP it's just more fun to have an archmage who's actually more powerful than every other unit in the game.

 

[Grey Fox]

in MP this doesn't matter, because everyone has the same strength.

Yes it DOES MATTER, cause it forces you to use magic or lose the game.

This is one of the MOST important aspects of balance.

...when players have multiple options or routes to victory, most or all of these options are about equally effective or feasible. To be perfectly balanced, each of these options would have to be strategically identical (in which case they wouldn't be substantial choices at all)........
In a suitably balanced game, players would make such choices based on their personal preference, strengths, and playing style, rather than on an inherent advantage in one option. If one option were weaker than the others, then it would rarely be selected by any player and will not contribute to the complexity of the game.

When only one among many options is viable the game play is imbalanced.

 

[uberfish]

The game is more imbalanced now because the religions with AoE priests dominate those which don't.

 

[PotatoOverdose]

The game is more imbalanced now because the religions with AoE priests dominate those which don't.

I disagree. While powerful, AoE priests are not the be all and end all of religions. Point in case: FoL. FoL leads to a better economy, more research, and more production which can lead to any number of things (getting archmages first, getting guild of the nine, etc.) RoK, another non-AoE religion facilitates growth and production through temples, soldiers of kilmorph, a wonder, early access to iron, etc. All of which make it quite powerful with the right civs (Clan and Khazad being prime examples).

 

[Monkeyfinger]

Yeah, the real problem is that Order and Esus suck dick. The rest of the other religions have something to make them competitive with the religions that offer powerful mages.

 

[Yaotzin]

Order and Esus are both better than say, RoK.

 

[Grey Fox]

RoK is a great builder religion and has nice synergy with the clan. (double Soldier to rush buildings). The gold is nice from the religion spread.

 

[PotatoOverdose]

Esus has its uses: the earliest archmage in the game (earlier than mages, particularly useful with puppets), mask, guaranteed access to shadows. RoK can be useful for any civ, not just the khazad or clan. Who can say no to early iron weapons? Order gets Sphener, social order, basilicas, and bless, and unyielding order, all of which can be useful as well. Sure any one feature of order isn't amazing, but taken as a whole, it is quite viable.

 

[Ashbery76]

Magic needs to be bit overpowered or you just have CIV4 warfare.

 

[Yaotzin]

RoK is a great builder religion and has nice synergy with the clan. (double Soldier to rush buildings). The gold is nice from the religion spread.

Oh sure, I like it. But for pure munchkin power I'd put it below Order and Esus.

Although I suppose something other than Esus while still being able to use Shadows and Nox Noctis makes it kinda meh. I'd like shadows to be Esus only and the invisibility of Nox Noctis to only work if you're in Esus.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

Could you change it so that the <bInBordersOnly> tag required that you cast the spell within your team's boarder instead of within the player's boarders? I find it very frustrating when I cannot use Bloom or Vitalize to help out a permanent ally. once there are no tiles left to improve in my own lands. It really seems like you should be able to help them out like this, as you are allowed to use workers to build improvements in their lands.

 

[Grey Fox]

Magic needs to be bit overpowered or you just have CIV4 warfare.

Magic should be; Powerful enough to compensate for it's weaknesses while not being too powerful to outshine everything else. While also being useful in other areas beside combat. Overpowered has a negative connotation, that means it is too good.

 

[Gelvan]

let's compare magic user production i.e. mages and archmages, with say an axemen rush. It's VERY easy to build x axemen go for a city and get it. magic on the other hand needs time, desciscion, mana. If I got an Archmage who can cast an air elemental I've got a huge advantage against an axemen defended city. that is what it should be like (at least imho ) - but if my mages - say I've got 3 or 4 - can't cast anything destructive with their tier 2 air spell, they really have no use at all (in the case of trying to get a city).

 

[reverend oats]

You should not be comparing mages to an axe rush; you should be comparing them to an champion rush or HA rush, because those come at the same level. And archmages are the best of the T4 units, except for maybe High Priests. In my current game I have a duo of Archmages holding off one of Basium's massive stacks, filled with Ophanim, Seraphs, and Repentants, and of course normal angles. Immortals or crossbows would simply be overwhelmed by such a force, no matter their promotions, but my archmages can weaken them enough so they have no chance of taking my city, and even allowing my axes to counter-attack. Magic is supposed to be the long-term payoff route, and that is what it is now.

However, I do think their could be more direct damage spells, maybe for the water 2 and Law 3 spells, as these are not the most interesting as of now. In fact, water 2 just plain sucks.

 

[Gelvan]

I agree that Archmages are very powerful even without spells like meteor.
Mages on the other hand are imo too much "balanced" by now. What's the reason to cap any direct damage spell to a level, where it simply doesn't make a difference at all? Why not just decrease the damage it does, but let the damage cap on a reasonable 70 or 80%? then you would need 4 turns or more to get to the cap; faster if you sacrifice some axeman, or have more mages. why should ANY unit use magic resistance when direct damage simply does not kill anything? to produce 30% damage you can use also two axeman. I see that for a city with 5 defenders you'd need more axeman to do 30% damage, but I personally think a mage shall be able to do more damage then a champion or immortal. because it's the only fun option against super stacks. catapults are a bit too "standard" in my view.

well, this can be discussed, as I see it's just that I really think dont nerf magic ANYMORE. It's nerved enough, really.

 

[Grey Fox]

The problem mostly is that there is no cap on how many units these spells damage, which it is on for example Fireball or Catapults. Or on an axeman attack (one unit). A pyre zombie attacking a stack or dying near it damages the entire stack and can kill (its not magic but it is the magic system). Maelstrom damages every unit in a 5 tile stack and every unit in a 50 tile stack. A catapult Might damage all of them in the first stack, but in the second only max 7 of them.
I'm not saying that magic should be balanced to catapults, just putting it in some perspective.

 

[PotatoOverdose]

Balance is all well and good, but if magic was equivalent in power to other military techs, why would anyone bother getting the more expensive magic techs (which are very, very weak initially) and then waiting and waiting for the units to mature, hoping that some nearby assassin doesn't eat them for breakfast? If magic was balanced against other combat lines, then the logical choice would be to go for the other combat lines because they would give immediate returns, as well as long term returns. Magic should be noticeably more powerful because the techs are more expensive, the units are more expensive (in terms of time), and everything about it is simply more costly. Putting things in perspective is nice, but cost should be put in perspective as well. Catapults are dirt cheap. Mages are not.

I don't understand why people keep bringing up pyre zombies, the sheer number of pyre zombies that have to explode in order to register a single unit kill is quite large. In my games (either as or against the sheaim), dying due to an explosion is a rare event...

 

[[to_xp]Gekko]

Could you change it so that the <bInBordersOnly> tag required that you cast the spell within your team's boarder instead of within the player's boarders? I find it very frustrating when I cannot use Bloom or Vitalize to help out a permanent ally. once there are no tiles left to improve in my own lands. It really seems like you should be able to help them out like this, as you are allowed to use workers to build improvements in their lands.

seconded. I'll also agree with reverend oats about water 2 sucking badly. it needs to affect the whole stack imho. I'm not a fan of spells only affecting the caster. stoneskin should affect the whole stack for example, and of course be a lot weaker.

 

[Grey Fox]

Nah, this way you can make specialist mages. Stoneskin is VERY nice as it is, I like it. And water walking is nice, good to use in combo with other water walking units (OO anyone?) would probably be too good if it gave it to the entire stack.