[BETA-3A][SUGGESTIONS] regarding the magic system and UI

from Elemental Forums

Ok after playing a lot of games with the main focus on magic my initial impressions were only reinforced:

the current system is micro intensive while it has little strategic importance which is the worst of all combinations.

 

Here are my suggestions making it better:

 

City Buff Spells: 

Current Problem: you have to go to every city enchant it wait till mana is regenerated go to the next buff it and so on.

-Remove individual city buff spells, instead the buffs become global i.e. all your cities are effected once the spell is cast

-Add hints to the city UI,  so i can see which spells are currently in place on that city

-if you want to keep individual city buff spells at least make them castable from anywhere in your territory it just sucks having a big empire and riding along your cities wasting a ton of turn just because you learned a new spell

 

 

Buff Spells: 

-Remove the current buff system, instead make buffs like arcane weapons auras, i.e. you cast the spell and all units in your stack will gain the buff.

-give the aura buff either an upkeep, a magic regeneration penalty or it just takes some essence as long as active (for example arcane armor has an essence 'cost' of 1,  if your caster has 10 essence and you activate the aura you only have 9 essence however if you deactivate it you will have 10 again)

 

==> still strategic importance perhaps even more so, but with next to no micro

 

Caster UI:

-when i have a caster selected and right click on any tile i want a dropbox which gives me all possible spell that could be cast on this tile, for example i have my sovereign selected and right click on a city i can cast city buffs, but if i right click on an enemy i can cast offensive spells and so on

 

==> right click -> choose spell -> left click -> done  much easier and intuitive then the current system

-the current UI is an impertinence to the player, especially when there are a lot of spells researched it causes eye cancer to find the right icons.

 

 

Champions: 

-i think frogboy already mentioned it, but skill trees or something comparable are a must for champions and the sovereign. nearly every 4x fantasy game has a system akin to this. heroes3/aow2 (with the latest unofficial patch) is years old please don't make elemental worse. just increasing stats is really dull.

 

 

The adventure system:

-quests need a separate tab so i can see what quests i have active, where they are and how far i have progressed, basically a quest book is needed.

-researching adventuring should give me more option then just to gain access to more quests, maybe give me better skills in combination to point above.

 

The UI in general:

-need a complete overhaul, frogboy already mentioned that the empire tree is getting some love if you do this right you should even be able to totally remove the whole section on the bottom of the screen (this is the worst part of the ui currently and imho should be just removed for a much better system)

 

-if i want to build in my city just let me activate a dropbox by right clicking on the city i can then choose to build building or train units

again: ==> right click ->choose building or unit -> left click -> done

 

-have the bar of city display what is build and how long it will take

 

-have the city ui display on the cloth map as well if choose to

 

-spell research need a better ui, basically it should be easier to recognize each sections, i.e. which spells are learned which available and which are being learned. perhaps give each section a different colored background

 

and most importantly:

 

-let the player customize the ui to a huge amount (and mean with out mods)

2,388 views 4 replies
Reply #1 from Elemental Forums Top

Buffing Up buffs is imho work for later stages. When balance is less abstract and less obscured than now. I believe that current focus is more on principles than on details. Buffs work, they help, they are "eligible for fun". Making them fun and balanced will be done in due time.

Yep, spells are a pain to select once you have a bunch, but right click is a tad to royal for them. Maybe something with CTRL or some other "shiftstate", but then again, AFAIK SD delays interface till the actual systems are set in stone.

Champs... meh... that'd be a killer to balance and then a killer again to manage... Imagine playing 20 games with 10 champions each and you'll probably grasp what I'm talking about...

Adventure - see above (both about interface and advancement).

UI.

Empire tree can get pesky. Let's hope they don't mess up the obvious "virtues" of interface like intuitiveness and functionality...

Spell research HAS a good UI. Other than complementing clicking with dragging it has all the info and options. Ok, maybe it lacks filters, and descriptions could use some work, but that's about it.

And that last one - All hands for it... except its a boatload of work and it's not yet major interface time.

Reply #2 from Elemental Forums Top

have you played the first neverwinter nights? you could make the spell system ui a bit like it:

right click on a tile and you get a circle of buttons with the spells that could be used.

regardless on how it is done the current system need to be completely overhauled.

 

as for buffs: either make them auras as described above or make them castable as long as the units are within your territory. running around in circles just to keep them up is annoying.

 

Champs... meh... that'd be a killer to balance and then a killer again to manage... Imagine playing 20 games with 10 champions each and you'll probably grasp what I'm talking about...

 

End of quote

 

you can't be happy with the current system, do you? right now champions are so boring and generic it is not even funny. so i can recruit a named unit that is weak and generates some gold per tun whoop the doo. i would rather see less champions but with more of an impact. heroes 3 was one of the best games that did this right (but it lacked on other aspects of course).

 

with the current system they could remove the champions entirely and i would not miss them, which says everything.

Star Control: Origins
Reply #3 from Elemental Forums Top

I would add I would like to see some strength/skill requirements for champions using various weapons. Someone with 8 strength shouldn't be walking around with a claymore, plate armour and the like. Imagine a 120 lb person trying to fight with equipment on weighing almost as much as them!

Reply #4 from Elemental Forums Top

-if you want to keep individual city buff spells at least make them castable from anywhere in your territory it just sucks having a big empire and riding along your cities wasting a ton of turn just because you learned a new spell
End of quote

I don't have a problem with having spells that only effect one city.  Globals should be there too but only at high levels and great cost.  The main thing I would like to see though is the ability to cast them from anywhere.  That or maybe give us a special building (a mage tower) that allows us to cast spells anywhere with some restrictions when we are stationed there.