Sorcery Spells

[Kaz]

Some of you may have noticed when I recently linked to a work-in-progress layout idea for the sorcery screen, that I have been considering fleshing out the spells a little. As it currently stands each faith has a different name for some of the spells, but there is not actually any difference between the effects.

I have been considering breaking the spells down into 8 categories, and using the various different faith names for spells to give each spell with a different name, a different effect. All faiths would have access to all spells.

e.g.

Mood Spells
- Calming Chant : Increases income by boosting productivity for duration of spell
- Inspire Devotion : Increased income by boosting immigration (if possible) for duration of spell

Elan Spells (taken from ideas in old code-bases / failed recodes / godsign etc)
- Sacrifise Troops : Kill troops and gain elan in return
- Elan Drain : Drain elan from an ally within the faith, or an enemy outside it

Summon Spells (can only have one summon at a time)
- Walking Damned - Summons T1 troops
- Crypt Walkers - Summons T2 troops
- Awakened Spirits - Summons T3 troops
- The Rising - Summons T4 troops
- Ghostly Prowlers - Summons T5 troops

Invocation Spells
- Shifting wall - invokes forts
- Divine Temples - invokes temples

Shield Spells (maximum shields include all variants - not max for each varient)
- Cyclone Spill - sorcery shield
- Spiked Wall - war shield
- Wild Design - thievery shield

Fog Spells (can only have one fog at a time)
- Solid Darkness
- Creeping Murk
- Blazing Noise
Not 100% sure which variation to go with. Could be 1 fog per attack type (war, scum, sorc) or different types of fog with different chances of happening e.g. normal fog, killing fog etc

Eradication Spells
- Shattering Calm - Kills Peasants and Destroys Temples
- Rousing Wind - Destroys Temples
- Foul Light - Kills Peasants

Obliteration Spells
- Hurricane - Destroys Forts and Buildings and Kills Peasants
- Lightening Lance - Destroys Forts and Kills Peasants
- Banshee Deluge - Destroys Buildings and Kills Peasants

It's the Eradication and Obliteration spells I'd like to currently discuss.

They would be easy to code and would give a sorcerer a more directed option should they wish it. For example, they could destroy forts without obliterating the rest of the kingdom.

Based on the increase in fort usage, the fact they'd be reasonably easy to implement, and the fact that I'm considering these enhancements for the future anyway, we 'could' have the eradication and obliteration spells active next age.

[Aeyliea]

Sorc is my thing anyway.

So, for say eradication spells:

Shattering Calm: Peasant/Temple kill remaining at current levels (like 8 or 9% on Sidhe with faithless message)

Rousing Winds: Twice as powerful as Shattering Calm for temple destruction, or maybe instead of stronger per hit, use a different calculation to figure damage - AKA, (rough figures mind) Instead of having 10 times as many temples to reach faithless, it would only take 7.5x times as much, granting an edge to warrant a spell that just kills temples and nothing else? I like the idea of either or. (icreased damage or decreased temple-versus-temple ratio)

Foul Light: Significantly more effective at killing peasants? than shattering calm?

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As for obliteration spells, I do not see a need to have a spell that destroys only buildings and not forts, but there is plenty of reason for a spell that destroys forts but not buildings.

Also, another option I just though of is damage rates remain the same for all of the obliteration spells but elan cost changing dependaing on the spell used....

[Kensington]

The problem as it always had been is to not make one method more powerful than others.
The game 'Scissors, paper, stone' probably gives a good way of making sure that all things are beatable.

[Kaz]

The problem as it always had been is to not make one method more powerful than others.
The game 'Scissors, paper, stone' probably gives a good way of making sure that all things are beatable.

Splitting the spells doesn't really make sorcery more powerful. It really just makes it more precise, but the change is advantageous more to the kingdom being sorced than the sorcerer. As the spells would cost the same elan, the only real way the sorcery would get an advantage is that they can be more precise, and I could improve backlash odds slightly.

Take for example the Low Spell (Eradication) as it currently stands the highest level of destruction a Sidhe can bring to bear is 8% peasant death and 7% temple destruction. If you compare that to a Centaur scumming, unseen scumkills take down 4% peasants, and unseen temple burns take down 10% magic buildings.

I dont really want to make kills easier, and 8% is probably high enough. It might make sense to nerf the percentage for the combined spell (it'd still be higher than it was at the close of evernight) and leave the single spell at the level it currently stands. But you could raise the temples destruction to 10% and it would just equal the thievery version, with the addition of requiring elan, and risking backlash.

We'd probably be looking at something like

Sidhe Faithless Low Spell (Current) = 8% peasants, 7% temples, 5 in 100 backlash
Sidhe Faithless Shattering Calm = 6% peasants, 5.5% temples, 5 in 100 backlash
Sidhe Faithless Rousing Wind = 10% temples, 4 in 100 backlash
Sidhe Faithless Foul Light = 8% peasants, 4 in 100 backlash

Sidhe Faithless High Spell (Current) = 6.25% buildings, 10% forts, 6.25% peasants, 9 in 100 backlash
Sidhe Faithless Hurricane = 4.75% buildings, 8% forts, 6.25% peasants, 9 in 100 backlash
Sidhe Faithless Lightening Lance = 10% forts, 6.25% peasants, 8 in 100 backlash
Sidhe Faithless Banshee Deluge = 6.25% buildings, 6.25% peasants, 8 in 100 backlash

[Kensington]

I guess I was talking in general Kaz, been a long time since I played but the notion of some action beating another one is the equality needed. A guild could invest heavily in sorcery but always be beaten by those with troops, those with troops beaten by scum and so on. The guild who wins is the one who has the best combination. How you divvy up the different actions in each faction would be irrelevant, to the actions between factions.

[Kaz]

So what's the general opinion? Should I spend some time expanding the sorcery options in order to reduce the requirement to obliterate kingdoms to reduce forts for next age. Or leave it on the to-do 'sometime' list?

[Calen]

I definitely would like to see the spells that target forts in the game. It would give us a nice option instead of using the lotting spell.

[Darnivan]

Yeah, it would be nice to separate fort targeting from the general building, even as an attacker I would prefer the lands to still have build acres once I get through the forts so there are some left to capture.

[Reylan Talonspyre]

That seems pretty cool. I like the different choices you would then have with Sorcery. Summoning T5 scummers would be awesome and another interesting way yo get around high scum kingdoms that are sometimes too big to scum. An extra 2 turns to get some more scum is pretty interesting.

[Kaz]

Just so you know, the variations of the offensive spells are now coded and being tested in the development client. They will be live next age.

I'll probably do the inspire/calming chant variation too as it's pretty simple to do.