Spell Feedback and Review(long)

[smjjames]

yea, I'd probably agree that the entrophy sphere needs a complete revamp, maybe wipe the slate clean so to speak.

Anyways, maybe sanctify should be made a disciple only spell? after all, sanctify sounds like something that a priest would use, not an adept or mage. Also, boost the effect of sanctify, there aren't usually alot of ruins around unless you want to have a mage or whatever following your armies stomping through an enemy empire.

I agree on the fair winds, to be REALLY useful, you would need to have an adept on a ship constantly casting it, and I don't think it works well that way. Although, I like the idea of using tornado in place of that one.

It was mentioned on the other thread about the creation, force, and dimensional spheres that Kael wanted to move the old whirlwind from air 2 to force. I don't know how long ago this was and it may have just been an idea at the time. So, why not use wirlwind and change the name to tornado since it's the same idea and use that for Air1. The graphics for the tornado could use the similar effect as the air elemental already has, but make it dirtier.

If the graphics for tornado is based on the air elemental, the graphics for the air elemental might have to be changed so that it is more distinct.

 

[uberfish]

I still think that treants need a boost, and still think that giving them siege abilities would be best, for the Elves sake. Elves should not depend so much on Fire for siege.

I don't think treants really need to be any stronger, just because of the large numbers of them spawned by the Ljosalfar worldspell. I think we could use a specialised siege spell in general though to fill the gap left by meteor's removal, my suggestion was to place a new spell for this purpose at earth 2 where stoneskin currently sits.

 

[Arcite36575]

And I love Regeneration to death; please don't take that away. It's just wonderful when you're defending from collateral or using units that don't have ready access to March.

Yep. I love this spell. It's definately in my top 5 of favorite spells. I don't know why more people like it. My prefered strategy for attacking other countries is usually by blitzing. Having regeneration allowing you to to keep advancing and attacking every turn instead of having to stop everytime you attack/get attacked. This works especially well if you have the promotions strength 5 and vampirism for a total of "25% healing in enemy lands" every turn. I'd really hate to see this spell lost to something pretty mediocre (IMO) like Burning Blood.

Side note, I never even bother building archmages anymore. I think as a whole, the level 2 spells are superior compared to level 3 spells, especially since mages as so much easier to get than archmages. When you are attacking an enemy stack of 20+ units, I would rather cast maelstorm and hit every unit for 25% damage rather than use a summon to attack ONE unit.

I agreed with the decision to nerf archmages a few versions ago. They were just way too powerful (crush, meteors, etc). Now however, every archmage is just another summoner (with maybe the domination spell). At the very least, I would allow all archmages to get the twincast promotion by getting the strength 5 promotion first, and allow the twincast promotion to either double or amplify (to a lesser extent) other attack spells spells.

 

[Zechnophobe]

I have to get on the side of regeneration, I'd be sad sad panda with it gone. It's a better March promotion, and wonderful for vampires. Given that body 1 is +1 move, and body 2 is March, you add a lot of speed to an army with the combination.

Flesh golem is really the only odd one out, but it's a cool spell, and I think unique enough to keep its position.

 

[Nor'easter]

@Kael:

Just a quick comment on Sanctify and Courage.

You describe Sanctify as boring and Courage as having a limited effect. Maybe that's true, I don't know, but I agree with Uberfish that these are necessary to counter other game mechanics. A Sanctify-type spell is needed both for gameplay and also a flavor/lore point of view -- a simple way to counter the effects of a rising AC.

As for Courage, there are enough units in the game with the Fear promotion that Courage is helpful -- especially on those occasions when you want to send your Beastmasters off to capture a dragon.

Just my quick thoughts.

Keep up the great work on this mod, by the way.

 

[KillerClowns]

@Kael:

Just a quick comment on Sanctify and Courage.

You describe Sanctify as boring and Courage as having a limited effect. Maybe that's true, I don't know, but I agree with Uberfish that these are necessary to counter other game mechanics. A Sanctify-type spell is needed both for gameplay and also a flavor/lore point of view -- a simple way to counter the effects of a rising AC.

As for Courage, there are enough units in the game with the Fear promotion that Courage is helpful -- especially on those occasions when you want to send your Beastmasters off to capture a dragon.

Just my quick thoughts.

Keep up the great work on this mod, by the way.

Of course, both could be improved. Maybe add some other uses for sanctify and courage? Of course, both are needed.

 

[Monkeyfinger]

To those saying blinding light is too much on Rathas, what would you replace it with? Aside from it they are just more expensive Chariots - between the cost and the religion requirements I think it's good that they have a very strong ability.

I like the idea of renaming it Flash and turning Blinding light into a buffed, tier 3 version of its current self.

Also, add more votes for keeping regeneration, courage, and sanctify, for reasons stated.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

You could switch Blinding Light and Revelation if you want.

 

[Monkeyfinger]

I think it's good that they have a very strong ability.

Revelation

Revelation isn't worth 60 extra hammers unless you're fighting the Sidar or Svartalfar. In other words, unless fighting those races, I would always build regular chariots instead of Rathas if Revelation were their spell.

 

[vivictius]

Just to put my 2 cents in, letting Wall of Stones be castable outside a city would be very, very nice. I also agree with the others in favor of regeneration, I also find courage to be quite nice, actually more for the increased healing then dealing with fear.

 

[Uberness]

Very well writen review of the spell lines, and I like the idea of just letting the four elements and death have a lvl 3 summons.

Spectres seem abit weak though, weaker then a skeleton for only fear.

Rust makes the entropy line all worth it, but it's overpowered, being able to lower a units strength by 1 2 or 4 points AND lower strength by 10% is just to much, you can cut the strength of any army using weapons in half and they need to retreat back to there city to fix it, deadly if there trying to invade.

Maybe make it so rust is -25% strength to weapon users, or Bronze/iron/mithril weapon is replaced by Rusty Bronze/iron/mithril weapon, +1/2/4 defense +0 attack

Make dance of blades +2 first strikes and 25-50% chance to wear off per turn

Summoning feels really lacking in the early game, you basicly just got skeletons for your power units and you don't need summoning for that, more rank 2's of around 5 or 7 strength with various bonuses and disadvantages will help, also, I miss the imps with random magic spheres for getting a guy with spring, but I suppose the AI couldn't handle it well.

 

[Zechnophobe]

Very well writen review of the spell lines, and I like the idea of just letting the four elements and death have a lvl 3 summons.

Spectres seem abit weak though, weaker then a skeleton for only fear.

Mm, you haven't actually built a Spectre have you? The pedia shows them at strength 3, but they're strength 4 base, due to Death Affinity. Death Affinity also means that they get stronger if you get a few death nodes out there. I'd say they are a pretty decent summon, all things considered.

 

[Polycrates]

This is a great topic - while I strongly approve of the merger of the two arcane threads, the resulting spheres/spells haven't all held up well.

One thing I'm not really keen on is that now Priests can be a better choice for direct combat magic.
Veil gets a fantastic damage spell, as does Octopus, and Leaves gets a quite decent summon. Since all these guys can cast their uber spells as soon as they're built, and have lower technological requirements, and now don't even require a specific resource, they can kinda out-mage the mages.

It seems to me that this really should be more the province of the mages rather than the priests - whose role perhaps is more as buffing/healing+quite good at direct combat, while the mages provide the fragile artillery. Currently, it's really only Death, Air and Fire that give Level 2 offensive punch. Moving some summons to level 2 would be a great change, as well as switching over some of the spells from divine to arcane. (I hardly ever get to Level 3, so I make no comment about the relative L3 arcane and divine spells).

So I would prefer Tsunami as a Water II spell, with maybe the OO priest getting Mutation again (I think this is a great fit for OO, and works better as a priest spell) and a waterwalking ability. Side bonus: it gets Mutation out of the hands of Loki!

Stoneskin is kinda useless as a mage spell; worse than this, it promotes using mages in direct combat to get them XP, which always feels kinda cheaty. I think this would be much better as a RoK priest spell (giving shield of faith to Empyrean priest, perhaps); thus making them a formidable combatant. Another suggestion: allow it to preferentially apply to any unit in the stack with the Hero promo.
As an alternate Earth II spell, perhaps something that batters city defences very quickly. It feels kinda odd that tree-loving Elves have to use Fire magic to reduce city defences; and the fireball, while a useful multi-tasker, is pretty slow at the direct battery.
And for Earth I, I agree with the idea of having Wall of Stone castable outside a city (though perhaps with a lesser effect).

I think Leaves priests are fine without Summon Tiger (Bloom is one hell of a spell already). A suggestion: Move Treetop Defense to Leaves Priests, give Nature I a Summon Animal spell which grants a random animal (you'd have to make sure to flag them so they couldn't be settled in cages, of course). Death I already gives a permanent Str4 summon, so a temporary animal of str 2-5 (-20% city strength) wouldn't be particularly overpowered, and would give the Summoner trait an earlier opportunity to make a difference.

I'm kinda okay with Veil priests having Ring of Flames (since it's sort of iconic and all), though it's kinda a duplicate of Maelstrom (which, while in need of a tone-down, is better as an arcane spell). But I do think it would be better changed to a non-direct-damage spell (some sort of debuff to nearby enemies sort of like Wither might be appropriate). And I don't think Cure Disease is appropriate for them (Veil is powerful enough already, and its absence is a flavourful weakness).

I want to come out in praise of Regeneration too; combined with Haste, it makes for a great spell to really keep a big stack attack going. So Body is a really nice synergistic school when combined with a big army, even if it doesn't have a direct combat benefit.

 

[Lance of Llanwy]

Perhaps the Chaos 3 spell can be a damage spell that inflicts some sort of nerf on its victims. Or, perhaps...it's random? It has a wide(but balanced) damage range and sometimes inflicts a completely random nerf? Or maybe, if you're REALLY unlucky, it might back-fire on you(or help your intended victims.) It's Chaos after all...IMO, it ought to be capable of delivering great results, but also be sort of unreliable. But it'd be good in the balance...

For Law...I always feel it should be a primarily "buffing" sphere. Perhaps stick in something to reduce crime-rate in there somewhere, as a sort of "side-effect" to one of the buffs? It seems pretty logical...

 

[Gromblmompf]

Would it help with the Water walking problem if Water walking gave something like -50% strength? Sounds quite reasonable to me and that way even a tsunami´ed ship had a good chance to sink the water walking guy who is sieging your coast. Attacking cities from water tiles with Drowns etc. would also be less easy.

Water walking would have to be automatically removed once your guy steps on normal ground again tho.

 

[schlalex]

I agree, that there are far too many summons at the sphere III. Many good suggestions were made. I personally would love to see a comeback of the meteor spell. Of course it should be changed. What about making Summon Meteor a Earth III Spell? I takes 3 turns to cast (like bloom), i mean the rock must reach Erebus 1st, that takes some time, but then has devastating effects, like killing the best defender plus collateral dmg to maybe 50% of all units hp.
After reading it again, maybe make it a RoK Spell, fits greatly with earth&dwarven.

 

[uberfish]

I'd change the ratha ability to something like this:

Dazzle - has a chance to inflict a temporary promotion on adjacent enemy units, -25% strength when attacking, this would make it a good defensive and stack protection ability while preventing a few ratha from holding off an entire army.

The trouble with having super powerful abilities on ratha, priests etc is that they're easily mass producable, whereas mages require mana nodes, a levelled up adept, cash to upgrade, and have less combat strength. Mages should really have more powerful spells to compensate, but things like RoF and tsunami set the bar extremely high.

Also, maybe wall of stone cast outside a city could give you an instant fort, that'd be useful.

 

[Amuro]

So I would prefer Tsunami as a Water II spell, with maybe the OO priest getting Mutation again (I think this is a great fit for OO, and works better as a priest spell) and a waterwalking ability. Side bonus: it gets Mutation out of the hands of Loki!

.

Are you mad ? It will break the game like never.

 

[GePap]

I think that the tier4 Elemental summonses need to be buffed up, and made more distinct. I mean, we are talking about an living representation of an entire sphere - those things should be fierce. Perhaps they should be made permanent, like the Kraken (which is a great summons), allowing them time to XP up.

Earth elementals should defintely have the ability to bombard city defenses - it makes complete thematic sense, and would give us one more spell besides fireball to weaken City defenses.

Air elementals are just fine as they are, given their reach and spawning lighting elementals.

If possible, water elementals should have greater mobility down rivers, which would be thematically correct - and a little stronger.

 

[Psychic_Llamas]

based on kaels reply here are my suggestions (in blue):

Air
Mana effect- Boosts affinity
1. Fair Winds (4)- replace with either: 'Fleet of Foot' adds a promotion that grants +20% chance to withdraw, and wears off at the end of turn. OR 'Scry' (same as Floating Eye from meta magic 1). make fair winds an OO only tier 1 spell.
2. Maelstrom (6)- love the spell but it is a balance issue
3. Summon Air Elemental (8)- I like the 4 elemental speheres havign their tier 3 summons, but okay with removing the rest

Body (all good here)
Mana Effect- Boosts heal rate in borders
1. Haste (9)- about perfect
2. Regeneration (5)- its okay, nothing great
3. Graft Flesh (7)- fun spell, not sure about game balance but i will probably never remove it since its kinda a hallmark of our weird design

Chaos (never been a fan of chaos, but i can never think of anything better )
Mana Effect- Chance to cause mutation
1. Dance of Blades (2)- Replace with "Rage", has a small chance to turn all adjacent units (friendly included) into barbarians?
2. Mutation (8)- Mutation is to powerful to be an adept spell, its about the perfect definition of a tier2 spell
3. Summon Pit Beast (6)- love the spell but your right that we could afford to have the slot be a non-summon (if we could come up with a cool chaos 3 spell i would move this to an entropy 2 spell)

Death (great sphere)
Mana Effect- Boosts affinity
1. Raise Skeleton (9)- just about perfect
2. Summon Spectre (8)- very appropriate
3. Lichdom and Summon Wraith (9)- between the 2 this sphere works out nicely

Earth (rubbish, worst of the elemental spheres by far)
Mana Effect- Increases mineral discovery chances
1. Wall of Stone (4)- Replace with 'Stoneskin', add +1 defence strength and low level magic resistance to all units in the stack, 75% chance of wearing off, or romoved with combat.
2. Stoneskin (4)- Replace with 'Tremors' reduces fortifications of cities.
3. Summon Earth Elemental (8)- good elemental summon

Enchantment- (not a bad spere, but it needs a little something...)
Mana effect- +1 happy
1. Enchanted Blade (10) add another additional spell 'Enchant Forge', which builds an 'enchated forge' building in a city, which adds the enchanted blade promo to all units built in the city. will reduce micro considerably.
2. Flaming Arrows (8) the same goes for this one, add another additional spell 'Enchant bower', which builds an 'enchated Bower' building in a city, which adds the enchanted Flaming Arrows prmotion to all units built in the city. again, will reduce micro considerably.
3. Spellstaff (8)

Entropy- (another crappy sphere, need severe tweeking)
Mana Effect- Decreases enemy heal rate in your lands
1. Wither (2) replace with 'Heat Burst', (when energy is used and converted to heat it s said to be heading toward entropy. it is theorised that eventually the universe will consist only of heat, as that is the lowest form of energy.) deals a very minor ammount of fire damage to all units adjacent to the caster, cap the damage from this spell.
2. Rust (6)
3. Enervation (1) Replace with a spell that grants negative afinity of -1 strength for global entropy mana count. so if there are 4 entropy mana sources i nthe world, the unit gets a permanent -4 strength. high chance of resistance. affects only one unit at a time, does not affect heroes.

Fire- perfectMana Effect- Boosts Affinity
1. Blaze (6)
2. Fireball (10)
3. Summon Fire Elemental (8)

Law- Boring sphere. Maybe Einherjar goes down to rnak 2, valor goes to rank 3 (and never expires) and we spice up the rank1 a bit? (i agree with this, swap einherjer and valor, make valor more potent and permanent.)
Mana Effect- reduces maintenance
1. Loyalty (4)- replace with something which adds a building to a city, that reduces war wearyness a bit, and automatically adds the loyalty promo to units built.
2. Valor (7)- replace with Summon Hosts of the Einherjar
3. Summon Hosts of the Einherjar (6)- replace with spiced up Valor

Life (useless sphere)
Mana Effect- increases health
1. Sanctify (4)- replace with 'Restore', heals units on the tile a small ammount, removes hell terrain, reduces the AC a bit.
2. Destroy Undead (3)- replace with a spell that adds a promotion that adds death resistance and undead slaying.
3. Ressurection (4)- allow eithe unlimeted ressurections, or make it add the immortality promotion. also add a second tier 3 spell, like with death, called 'Summon Angelic Choir', summons a group of angels that followed Sucellus, these anges can cast 'heal', 'Restore' and 'bless', and have 4 holy strength, and 'demon slaying' 'angel' and guardsmen promotions.

Metamagic- I like this sphere
Mana Effect- none, instead the mana effect (reduces enemy resistances, increases spell damage) is applied to units that know the sphere, not just to those in the owners empire
1. Floating Eye - a good spell, but suits Air more imho. replace with 'Magic Missile' causes a bit of damage to a single enemy unit. cap the max damage dealt from this spell.
2. Dispel Magic
3. Summon Djinn - also a good spell but would be better id this was an amurite only spell, and replaced metamagic 3 with "cast Ring of Warding" which, if cast in a city, adds a building that makes all units immune to magic and damages summons, or, if out of a city, build an improvement that makes all units immune to magic and damages summons.

Mind- A decent sphere but I like your idea to switch charm person and inspiration
Mana Effect- increases research rate
1. Charm Person (4)- I like the spell but it is overpowered, it will be better as a rank 2 spell (better as rank 2)
2. Inspiration (6)- Decent but boring, it will do much better as a rank 1 spell (better as rank 1)
3. Domination (8)- A good spell

Nature- I think this spell is pretty good and I think treetop defense is a lot better now that it instantly fortifies the stack
Mana Effect- None (boosts a lot of non-summon creatures)
1. Treetop Defense (6) (does this spell even DO anything???, id much rather see entangle make a come back.)
2. Poisoned Blade (7)
3. Vitalize (9)

Shadow
Mana Effect- Boosts affinity
1. Blur (4)- replace with 'Stalk' which makes the unit unable to attacked or be attacked, and gain Hidden nationality.
2. Shadowwalk (6)- Maybe boost this into a rank 3 spell? (make this make the caster ignore terrain movement and make it level 3.)
3. Summon Mistform (6)- A good spell, but it would be a good candidate for a level 2 summon. (level 2 summon would be good)

Spirit
Mana Effect- increases GPP growth
1. Courage (4)- limited effect (not sure what to do with this, its ok really...)
2. Hope (6)- okay, but a bit boring
3. Trust (7)- I like this spell, but it may need something to improve it. (needs a secondary spell to boost the benefit of a spirit archmage. possibly 'Burning Spirit' which increases the amount of EXP gained from combat by 1, give it a 25% chance of wearing off, stacks with raider trait?)

Sun
Mana Effect- Boosts Affinity a good sphere.
1. Scorch (6)- decent spell
2. Blinding Light (7)- I could move this to rank 3, increase the range and reduce the resistance chance. A "Flash" spell could be created to keep the current (or a bit weaker) form for the ratha and such to use.
3. Summon Aurelis (7)- This could be weakened and moved to rank 2

Water
Mana Effect- Boosts Affinity
1. Spring (10)
2. Water Walking (8)- id like it if the Water 2 promotion istelf gave the caster water walking, as a pasive effect, and a secondary spell was added in here. perhaps 'Geyser' which causes a massive fountain of water to shoot out of the ground and scatter units in a nearby enemy stack and deal a small ammount of damage in the process. would be good counter for the dreaded SOD.
3. Summon Water Elemental (4)- I like the spell, but it is to weak. make water elementals able to cast water level 1 and 2 spells as well? and make them have permanent life duration if they do not touch land?