Magic System Ideas

[KGB]

Pillager,

Yup, my AD&D sensibilities are indeed offended by the idea of Wizards in Plate Mail / Axes of Slaying just as much as they are by Fighters using scrolls. There are only 3 ways to deal with that issue. (1) Ignore this issue with items but not magic. Seems illogical but I suspect this is how it's going to end up. (2) Make all items generic enough to work with any hero class. That's boring and doesn't fit well with the item slots that I've seen for Beta4 heroes. (3) Customize the item to the hero who first finds it. By that I mean you'd have a generic Plate Mail/Leather Armor/Robe icon for the armor slot. Then assign the power+item name when the item is found. So lets assume you are finding a hits +1 armor item. If you were a Wizard it would be the Robe of Defense which gives +1 hits. If you are a Ranger, a Leather of Defense giving +1 hits and if you were a Paladin a Platemail of Defense giving +1 hits. That way you get the right item with the right hero. Once in the game the item is fixed and if you transferred the item or the hero died the next hero would have to be the right type to use it. The only issue with this is you can end up with heroes who have items they can't use but at least it won't ever be at the time you find the item which would be annoying.

I think balancing 1 shot items is indeed going to be very tricky. Plus it's just extra inventory you have to carry around, transfer etc. Much easier to just not have it at all as it's far easier balance wise to just say either 'I have this skill with this hero and I can use it or I don't'.

I agree the spells need recharge times. I mentioned that in my 3rd paragraph when I said you wanted to design around a spell recharge system. No need to work out individual details of that until you start on the spells themselves other than a spell slot is used up until the recharge time for the spell that was cast there ends.

I also agree the sage should give a skill selection list to chose from. It's always preferable to let players chose instead of being told what they get. The former is skill based, the latter is luck based. So I'd like to see 3 choices like 'You find a sage. He offers to teach you (A) Engineering 10% (B) Chain Lightning Spell (C) Group Move +4 spell'. Then you'd pick the one you want. Sages could literally teach any skill in the game so that all heroes would benefit so Fighters might get something like (A) Undead Lore (B) Strength +2 (C) Learning + 15%.

Obviously the better the ruin/harder the quest the better the sages teaching would be so a L3 ruin might offer Command +1 for Fighters or a really good spell for a Spell Caster like Summon Archon/Elemental.

KGB

[LPhillips]

All sounds good. Agreeing with KGB once again.

Except on the items being non-generic. I think they could be generic. I see no reason to go to specific armor slots, etc. I know that's the decision that has been made, but it could always be overturned when heroes are further diversified. It seems like extra complication (learning curve!) and irritation without much benefit.

[KGB]

LPhillips,

This really belong in an item discussion but lots of items are clearly generic now.

Rings, Necklaces, Gems, Banners, Bracers etc. These are the miscellaneous items.

Then other items just have a generic enough name like 'Boots of Speed' or 'Bane's Crown' that you can imagine they are any kind of boots you want because it doesn't say platemail boots of speed. So that takes care of footwear and head items as even a 'Helm of Speed' doesn't have to be made of metal, it could be leather or crystal or some other neutral substance that any one could wear.

But some items obviously don't work. Those are the weapon, armor and shield slots. There you can't just say 'Weapon of Slaying'. You have to call it Axe/Bow/Dagger of Slaying. Those 3 slots unfortunately break the rule about Wizards wearing armor, Priests using bows, Fighters wearing robes etc.

The question is whether anything is going to be done about those 3 slots.

KGB

[Pillager]

Yeah, I've been thinking about class specific items ever since I saw the armor/weapon/shield slots.

There are some pros and cons to having items with class restrictions.....

One major con is killing a hero or looting a ruin and getting an item your hero can't use. This could be a real annoyance...but it would give the player a goal to work towards. IE: I found this amazing staff, now I need to get some gold and hire a wizard hero to use it.

Perhaps looting a level one ruin could yield the following possible rewards...small amount of gold, single 2-4 turn ally, lower level sage, 1st level item (that your hero can use), 2nd level item (that your hero can't use).

So a wizard could find a decent magical weapon or armor in a ruin, but couldn't use it...you would need to get the item to a more martial hero, or hire one (if you don't currently have one).

Class restrictions on items would have one nice benefit. It would encourage players to use a variety of heroes (even if they thought one was slightly superior). Right now most players seem to use the dreadknight exclusively (although they aren't the best on larger maps). I get a little bit bored of hacking down endless hordes of dreadknight clones.

[Pillager]

I've been thinking about the spell casting interface...

Maybe instead of a slot. A magic using hero would have a spell book (or two) depicted next to the hero's picture in the inspect heroes window.

Clicking on the book would make a window pop up with a list of the spells your hero knows. You would select a spell to cast by clicking on it and closing the window with the ok button. The spell's glowing image would then be shown in place of the book, along with a number telling you how long this spell will take to recharge.

If you really wanted to make it pretty, clicking on a book could open it and enlarge it...each page could have one of your heroes spells on it along with a description of its effects. Clicking on a page corner would flip to the next/previous page. But, that's just eye candy...certainly not necessary.

So, I think instant effect spells like summon, bless, true sight, alchemy, etc. have a pretty strong mechanic. But what about spells with continuous effects, like enchantments?

[KGB]

Pillager,

If there are class specific magic items I think you have to rig it so that the hero always finds/acquires an item he can use. So if it's going to be an 'armor item with +1 hits' then if it's found by a Paladin it would be Platemail, a Ranger it would Leather and a Wizard it would be a Robe. That guarantees that the finding hero can always use the item. The only time you could get a mismatch is if you gave the item to another hero or looted a dead enemy heroes corpse. That to me would be perfectly acceptable.

As far as continuous effects spells like enchantments go I don't see any reason to do anything different. All I would do is put an expiration time on the enchantment so that it lasted for a number of turns instead of forever since there isn't a mana pool concept. Lets use a Group Move +4 spell as an example. Instead of lasting forever like it did in DLR, it would have a number of turns associated with it. Say 3 turns + 1 turn per 2 hero levels. That way a L10 hero would get 8 turns of use and a L1 hero, 3 turns of use. Then like all other spells it would have a cooldown time, say 2 turns. So when you cast it as a L1 caster, it would give 3 turns of +4 move followed by 2 turns of cool down so all together your spell slot would be occupied for 5 turns. As a L10 caster it would last for 8 turns followed by a 2 turn cooldown so your spell slot would be occupied for 10 turns.

Note: I would allow voluntary canceling of enchantments. So if the L10 hero wanted to cancel after 4 turns of getting the bonus move they could but they'd still have to wait 2 turns to get the spell slot back.

KGB

[LPhillips]

Sounds very reasonable. But you have a possible balance issue with players being able to cast too many powerful spells at one time. Without some limit to total spell power (like mana), you'll have to restrict the types of spells that can be put into a specific slot. Sounds like a bit of a headache, but it would fit with the "spellbook" concept.

To explain: If you have a hero that can Summon Demon, Summon Archon, and Call Dragon, and there are three ability/spell slots, then the ability to cast them all in one turn is too much. Wait until a touchy situation, then instant super-army! Unless (returning to the concept of a pool), he were to invest his points over many, many levels specifically to be able to do that (by increasing his maximum stored power). Maybe you could allow only one summoning spell active? That would also restrict players from using two- or three- turn cooldown summoning spells too rapidly. Having three three-turn cooldown summoning spells alternating in three slots is just as unbalanced.

[Pillager]

LPhillips,

I don't think any hero would have access to three summoning spells for 4-5 turn units. A priestess would have 'summon archon' as her best summoning spell. A necromancer/warlock could possibly have 'summon demon'. And I'm not too sure 'call dragon' need exist at all.

Also, the wizard hero you are referring to would have spent skill points for an extra 'book'. And many more skill points for three high level spells. So, this example would likely be a very high level character. And after casting all these spells, the hero is pretty much useless for 5 turns (cooldown 5 for 5 turn summons).

I think that issues like this could be avoided by putting a little thought into the spells available to each class. Making sure that if a wizard has multiple summoning spells, they are of different levels (IE 'summon crow' and 'summon elemental').

Maybe a straight up wizard type could have a 'summon monster' spell..that summons a random creature ranging from a crow to a dragon in power. It could be a random roll, modified by level..so a high level wizard would likely summon a more powerful creature. Perhaps it could be affected by terrain too. So, if in snow, you could summon a yeti, while in hills you might get a giant.. or a sea serpent in the water....or a spider in a ruin.

[Pillager]

KGB,

The idea of finding a robe if you are a wizard vs armor if you are a fighter..and both items being exactly the same in effect... seems like a lot of trouble for no tangible gain.

If there were class specific items, they should give bonuses to the specific strengths/spells/skills of that class. Otherwise I wouldn't bother.

You could make it possible for a hero find 'class item 3' in a ruin (instead of a specific item). That would then be cross-referenced with character class to find the appropriate item. For a warrior type this might be a +1 hp armor..for the wizard it could be the tome of knowledge (an extra spell slot).

[KGB]

Pillager,

I'm not thrilled with the idea of class specific items either. I only suggested the most palatable option if such a thing is going to exist.

The problem with doing a 'class 3 item' being a spell slot for a Wizard and armor for a Warrior is from the hero screen layout we can see there are clearly 6 slots (helmet, armor, boots, shield, weapon, miscellaneous). So does that mean a Wizard just doesn't ever get to use some of those slots (weapon/armor/shield) and is thus limited to 3 items while other heroes might get up to 6 items?

The only other trade off I can see is if your hero gets 6 total slots to assign spells/items to. So Warrior types who can't use spells can use 6 items (helmet, armor, weapon, boots, shield, miscellaneous). Then Spell casters have to give up items slots for spells. So a Wizard would get 3 items slots (helmet, boots, miscellaneous) and 3 slots for spells. A Paladin might get 1 spell slot and 5 item slots. Of course that's also extra complex not not exactly intuitive either.

So we are back to: Class specific items, Restricted slot use (as I outlined above), or just let Spell Casters use stuff that makes no sense (armor, shields, weapons) from a fantasy point of view.

KGB