Stupid Raging Seas

[orgonebox]

Every once in a while, I like to play an elf game. Invariably, the Lanun will show up in the game, and I wait for them to get optics so that I can start to move all my important units away from any body of water, and just hope that I'm not at war with anyone when the Lanun use their world spell.

Well, in my current game, the Lanun had optics and had been at war multiple times without casting Raging Seas, so I became complacent. Then sure enough, out of the blue, Raging Seas is cast. I lost no less than twenty units, all the way from workers to mages to highly promoted rangers and archers - ridiculous and practically game-ending. Meanwhile the bulk of my remaining reserve forces have approximately 20-30% of their original strength.

I've complained about Raging Seas being overpowered before, but it occurs to me that since Tsunami causes a declaration-of-war, shouldn't Raging Seas do the same? I know the elves suffer more due to their cold vulnerability, but killing the better part of your best units, as well as wrecking towns and improvements, is way over the top for a spell without consequences.

Raging Seas should ask if the player wants to, or state that it will, declare war on everyone. In that regard, the spell could even have the damage limit lifted for non-cold vulnerable civs. Otherwise, the spell should somehow be limited to tiles that have both coast and ocean adjacent, removing the potential for wrecking towns next to freshwater, or not be allowed to kill units. I hate having a fun game wrecked because I had three hundred turns of unit and economy building wiped out in one.

 

[Lade]

Assuming that was put to action, would the casters be allowed to make peace with everyone again, or would they be permanetly at war similar to the Illians ascension

It would seem kinda extreme for it to be permanent

 

[orgonebox]

Yeah, the Lanun would definitely be allowed to make peace after the requisite ten turns. I just think there ought to be more consequences for such a powerful spell, particularly given how blithely and foolishly the AI uses it. Other world-affecting equivalents, such as worldbreak, blight, or march of the trees have reciprocal nerfs. Raising the armageddon counter affects all living units, while March of the trees can seriously kill the economy and population of the elf civ while waiting for the forests to regrow.

 

[Zechnophobe]

So... a hurricane hits, and suddenly everyone declares war on Hannah? Sure you do damage all over the world, but does anyone know it was you?

Also, when you say you 'lost' units to it, you mean they were attacked after it was cast? I'm pretty sure that raging seas can't by itself kill units, just like Tsunami. (Maybe they were already wounded?)

 

[MiKa523]

Imho the real annoying thing about their world spell is that you have to rebuild a lot of improvements in and next to water, which is, especially on bigger maps, just too much MM at least for me.
I know that a big bad hurricane is supposed to damage stuff and kill ppl, but you can also do this by reducing size of coastal cities, just wound units and maybe a small chance to kill some buildings in those coastal cities, which would be less annoying to rebuild than a lot of improvements.

 

[Gilg]

So... a hurricane hits, and suddenly everyone declares war on Hannah? Sure you do damage all over the world, but does anyone know it was you?

Also, when you say you 'lost' units to it, you mean they were attacked after it was cast? I'm pretty sure that raging seas can't by itself kill units, just like Tsunami. (Maybe they were already wounded?)

I've seen a handfull of heroes die due to raging seas... I do not remember if they where injured at the time, but it kills a good part of my army if I get hit while building a coastal empire.

 

[deadliver]

I do not agree that Raging Seas should cause War. Would be nice if it gave a relations hit though.

 

[orgonebox]

It seems like cities next to more than one water tile get hit multiple times, causing units to die. I notice it the most with the elves. The last time I got hit with raging seas, I counted twenty-seven units killed, and that was after a reload from an autosave.

Raging Seas isn't like a hurricane - it's a massive tsunami that affects all "coastal" tiles. As I said - perhaps some kind of consequence for using it, whether relations hit or direct declaration of war on everyone, or a nerf that limits the spell's area of effect to only tiles that have coast and ocean adjacent. Personally, I don't see a declaration of war on everyone as that big a deal. If it's the AI Lanun, then the surrounding civs probably won't have troops ready, and if they do, they'll still have to sit and heal, while the Lanun were probably at war anyway - with a landlocked civ that would be unaffected, no less. For the human, it'd be like your own march of the trees plus strategic planning to deal with the consequences. And if your neighbors are elves, most of them are dead anyway, so walk in and take their cities.

 

[Gray-Z]

I had game where hannah was in a permanent alliance with minister koun of lanun. Turns out he also gets the world spell (a while ago not sure if he does anymore). She decides to declare war on me and *BAM* 2 raging seas. None survived. It was truly a moment. Took me a while to figure out what happened.

 

[Ksi]

It's a civ spell, it is supposed to be really powerful. I do not think it takes a rocket scientist to keep your heroes and highly promoted units out of coastal cities when you know it is likely to be cast.

 

[deadliver]

It's a civ spell, it is supposed to be really powerful. I do not think it takes a rocket scientist to keep your heroes and highly promoted units out of coastal cities when you know it is likely to be cast.

LOL. So true, but i do think there should be a relations hit. Otherwise wouldn't spells like River of Blood provoke war too? Or Stasis?

 

[orgonebox]

LOL. So true, but i do think there should be a relations hit. Otherwise wouldn't spells like River of Blood provoke war too? Or Stasis?

It's a civ spell, it is supposed to be really powerful. I do not think it takes a rocket scientist to keep your heroes and highly promoted units out of coastal cities when you know it is likely to be cast.

The problem lies in knowing when it's likely to be cast. I kind of think there should be a relations hit with river of blood as well, but the effects of river of blood are nowhere near as severe as raging seas. The spell's power as a world-spell is absurd considering that no other world spell has the same sort of world-trashing power without some kind of reciprocal negative consequence. And even highly-promoted units aren't the half of it - we're talking reserve combat forces, city defenders, workers, and the improvements they have to rebuild.

Never fear, however. I doubt anything will be done about it, and I usually end up reloading and moving important units that die if I become complacent even though I've noticed that the Lanun have been at war with someone for a while, have optics, and haven't cast raging seas.

 

[abculatter2]

And what if the world has little or no coastal tiles?

 

[fuzzy_bunnies]

Yea, from a roleplaying point of view if you knew that raging pirates were on the loose you'd keep your most important units away from the shore anyway.

BTW anyone know how far inland the raging seas effect goes? I don't think I've ever seen it used.

Also, maybe raging seas can have a cap to units but maybe have them do lethal damage to ships? Could also include all ships, not just those on the coast... but also docked and asea.

 

[Arctic Circle]

Don't belive in nerfing it. In the grand scheme of things, it isn't overpowered.

 

[deadliver]

Agreed, this is not the worst worldspell out there.

 

[DarkxL0rd]

lost my uber promoted sphener and basium to it. that sucked some kinda balls. ended the game for me right then and there. worlds spells shouldn't do that.

 

[orgonebox]

Agreed, this is not the worst worldspell out there.

Then what is the worst world spell? The only second that comes to my mind is the sheaim worldbreak.

My whole point is that Raging seas is the worst consequence-free world spell.

 

[deadliver]

I really hate the Mercurial worldspell, nukes all my infernal units including workers (killing many) while I cannot retaliate except to screw over my own ally...assuming the AI has not autocast spell for me and wasted it. Consequences? A diplomatic penalty is nothing to sneeze at.r