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My Sovereign picks only Life books as my magic picks , but all I encountered is Death shards...

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My Sovereign picks only Life books as my magic picks , but all I encountered is Death shards...

from Elemental Forums

(Disclaimer, I have not play the latest beta so if my assumption is incorrect, pls let me know)

Will this be quite frustrating that randomly generated map or a pre-designed map prevent you from using magic because of a pick-shard mismatch?   Don't get it wrong, I do like what SD's proposed shard system.  But I can also see that are multiple issues related to that.   Hopefully this discussion will make it fun instead of frustrating.

I am proposing the following:

When a player has chosen X Life magic research picks and Y picks of other colors, any virgin Shard the player capture will turn to a Life shard with the probability of X / (X+Y)

What it does is that you know that you will get the shards you need in the long run, but you have no exact control of when you are getting them.   How you choose your research picks affect how certain you get the correct shards you need.

(Optional) There are 10% probability that you will get a shard of  color that you do not research at all, when you capture a virgin shard.

15,901 views 28 replies
Reply #26 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting =Outlaw=, reply 23

Quoting Tasunke, reply 17

"If however, we went the route of charging 1 essence every time the shard is used ... then I fear it will break the game. If you have too much essence, its a war of attrition, and if you have too little essence, the option will be impossible to use."


Not sure what you are trying to say is wrong with this. Seems to be the modus operandi of all strategy games. If you have resources, you are able to fight it out and win, and if don't have them, you suffer.

 

End of =Outlaw='s quote

 

See, what I mean is that, if "Fireball" required 1 fire node, and you had to spend 1 essence to "enchant" the fire node, and you Cast the Fireball spell 20 times, you LOSE 20 essence. Thats potentially 2 levels of stats immediately lost, if not MORE.

Basically, changing for a one time cost of essence, that is fine. But every time you cast the spell? impossible to balance. These are temporary spells that are meant to cost Mana, not essence.

 

Anyways ... you should really only be fighting for resources in the Late game and Later mid-game (imho). I mean, if you sacrificed your Melee ability and your Nation's ability for the sake of casting spells, then you should be able to research and cast spells for about half of the game without having to hunt down the proper shard (imho). Of course shards can give bonuses, better spells, but it shouldnt' be impossible to use your mana-class without the proper shard, or else everyone will buy Multiple Magic Books.(if not all, they only 5 points)

And yes, someone mentioned that alternatively you could choose your book after finding the shard, and while a possibility, Im not sure its really adressing the right problem.

Reply #27 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting John_Hughes, reply 25
Simple and Elegant solution.

You don't pick your Magic Books until you find a Shard(s). Then it simply doesn't matter what Shard(s) you find, you get to pick the appropriate Magic Book.

If you don't like Earth Magic, then hope you don't get placed in an area with a majority of Earth Shards.

So no Land Screwed possiblity based on Shard dispersal, but there could be some sad Panda's if the Magic Books do not offer the same levels of Power across the Board...

Thus a Balanced Magic system will be super essential.
End of John_Hughes's quote

The drawbacks you mention are actually big problems. It could compromise the sovereign creation system. It would suck if you tailor your channeler to have synergy with fire, and you find nothing but wind. This also makes the potential multiplayer problems even worse.

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Reply #28 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Tasunke, reply 26
Quoting =Outlaw=, reply 23

Quoting Tasunke, reply 17

"If however, we went the route of charging 1 essence every time the shard is used ... then I fear it will break the game. If you have too much essence, its a war of attrition, and if you have too little essence, the option will be impossible to use."


Not sure what you are trying to say is wrong with this. Seems to be the modus operandi of all strategy games. If you have resources, you are able to fight it out and win, and if don't have them, you suffer.

 
End of =Outlaw='s quote


 

See, what I mean is that, if "Fireball" required 1 fire node, and you had to spend 1 essence to "enchant" the fire node, and you Cast the Fireball spell 20 times, you LOSE 20 essence. Thats potentially 2 levels of stats immediately lost, if not MORE.

Basically, changing for a one time cost of essence, that is fine. But every time you cast the spell? impossible to balance. These are temporary spells that are meant to cost Mana, not essence.

 

Anyways ... you should really only be fighting for resources in the Late game and Later mid-game (imho). I mean, if you sacrificed your Melee ability and your Nation's ability for the sake of casting spells, then you should be able to research and cast spells for about half of the game without having to hunt down the proper shard (imho). Of course shards can give bonuses, better spells, but it shouldnt' be impossible to use your mana-class without the proper shard, or else everyone will buy Multiple Magic Books.(if not all, they only 5 points)

And yes, someone mentioned that alternatively you could choose your book after finding the shard, and while a possibility, Im not sure its really adressing the right problem.
End of Tasunke's quote

Are you kidding ? Essence is just too precious to use it this way. You just can't spend it that way, it's too expensive for too few results. Magic won't ever be used if it work that way.

I was thinking about the spell points : instead of researching a new spell you could use some spell points (maybe 100) it changes the kind of a shard and have a fair chance to get a quest "bring some virgins to the dragon shard or it will try to kill you".

 

EDIT: or it could be a mini-game : each time you try to change the kind of a shard, it would become unavailable, and the four elements would be struggling inside it. You can use how many spell points you want to support the element you need. Each turn the game check if an element will take advantage. Each turn you spell points involved are used if the shard isn't of the kind you support. It could even lead to some tactical battle where your armies could be bought with spell points : 50 spell points ? You get 3 fairies, a hell hound and a minautore to fight against the fire waves of enemies. Or why not a tower defense game ?

Well ...