I have been following this post a bit and it seems like the core problem is with magic users. Procipinee is according to the lore a magic user. If her ingame talents are geared towards melee, she needs to be changed. I personally give her crown to a fighter as it doesn't help her to use it. The hole in gameplay is that a mage is only great at being a mage later in the game. The early game offers no strong mage tactics other than fire and even that requires level 2 spellbook. Mage Sovs need some staves that allow them to be relevant in battle. Procipinee should start the game with a fire staff that does about 4 fire damage with no Initiative penalty. She can still cast her magics, but also has a low damage ranged attack. All mage Sovs need something like this to start. Then random loot needs to have a few more spell staff options to carry things on. It would also be nice to see them in quests, though that fire longbow is a decent prize too for an escort service. Pariden is best at life, water and air magic. Those are really only good for fighters, not mages. With a full army it works fine. With a small army and a weak mage Sov, it doesn't work. As a beta tester I would say there is a significant hole in the early game here. Later on Pariden gets really strong because of magic books, scrying pools, and teleport. I still think the progression needs to see some balancing. Really the problems with Pariden stem from other areas of the game that are imbalanced. 

If I were to fix it, I would combine the Summoner trait with Warlock. So you get more powerful summons and that bonus to magic damage. Procipinee would get Life, Air, Fire to start. She needs fire to stand a chance as a mage. Her crown would work the same, but I would add in some new unit enchantments for casters. Then Attunement would get a boost to +6 Mana per turn. That is admittedly alot, but it is also needed to cast lots of magic. New levels of spellbooks would be near guaranteed. The difference would be that each one would have a harsher level requirement. Level 2 books would have a level 2 prereq. Level 3 would have a level 6 prereq. Level 4 would have a level 8 prereq and level 5 would be way up at level 12. You would always get a chance at levelup to choose these. Then I would add alot of new spells to even things out. The theme of magics would be the same, but you would get more choices on how to spend your mana to fit your strategy. Add new levels of summons for each spellbook. Add the staves I mentioned above. Allow the unit to cast a spell and create a staff of that magic type. Add new magical items unlocked in the tech tree for heroes only.

ddd888 makes alot of good points in this thread. Bingjack points out some areas where ddd888's analysis is not entirely accurate. Looking at both sides pinpoints the exact area of the game that is flawed. The real question is whether or not the devs are planning to address these issues in beta 5.

Agreed that non-direct damage mage sovs/champions are lacking. I'm not talking about the spells themselves. Buffs are great, there's just no incentive to focus on path of the mage or any caster traits if you want to be a buffer.

All the best buffs in the game can be found in the first 2 tiers of spells or is researchable. The only buff I can think of that's high level and worth it is mantle of oceans. Taking mage traits doesn't make these buffs any better. Their cost is so low that getting attributes to reduce cost is meaningless.

Other mage traits are +damage, +summon level, and +spell mastery. None of these affect a buffer. If you want a buffer, you might as well just choose any other path for your sov/champion. Your buffs will work just as well, but you'll be miles ahead in terms of survivability and damage.

The other problem is that EVERYONE has access to spells. Seriously, I don't think I've met a champion that didn't have access to spells. Since there's no difference in terms of buffs, why would I take a mage character for buffs over a melee character who has access to the same spells? There's just no incentive.

Procipinee is obviously designed to be a buffer. Scrying pool and her crown are both designed to help her to accomplisht that role. But why would I gimp her by taking path of the mage, which would be the most fitting path for her, lore-wise, when I can choose a warrior path and steamroll everything?

I'd love a set of traits that increases the effect that shards have on your spells. That would be a worthwhile trait that would make focusing on path of the mage actually useful for almost all types of casters.

Yes.  And again seanw3 is mostly right as well.  Except I wish he wouldn't classify a "mage" as needing direct offensive magic. Again, by RPG conventions, a mage is just someone who cast spells, and there are all sorts of different mages. Healer/Support, Control, Nuke, Summoner, Battlemage/Clerics.

You need direct damage magic to be a Nuker, not a "mage." I think they are distinct paths, and each should be a viable strategy. I think you should be able to get by as a nuker. I think you should be able to succeed as as a buffer , who makes their troops into "jedi". I think you should be able to get by as a summoner. Ideally their should be a stronger control set too, with tricky tactical options to outwit your opponents tactically.

I dont think any of these mage types should have to nuke on a regular basis to succeed. I even think it should be difficult for them to do so. I think the game should allow for overlap, but reward specialization.

The problem with nuking right now, is that currently it simply isn't cost efficient to do on a regular basis, compared to other alternatives. That could all change in a matter of weeks, as the game is rebalanced, and the AI improved.

I also wish spell schools as traits were rarer in the game, so starting spell schools were much more vital, and would play a much larger role in shaping strategy, and there were more purely melee characters out there. But currently in the game, everyone is a caster, and it doesn't really cost them anything to be both a good magic user, and a good melee warrior.

Heh. Looks like Pariden actually got nerfed in the new build. There's a -25% production penalty in place of Attunement which I don't remember being there before. Looks like the Devs agreed with me that Procipinee was Overpowered. 

It's probably my fault for going on about how many of the normal building priorities Pariden's abilities let you bypass.  That'll teach me.

In this case, I now agree Pariden is iffy. I would never play any faction with the inefficient penalty. It's just too severe in a game where production is currently so important. Although Enchanters still makes it almost worth it, because scrying pools rock under the current essence system.

Now the only other stock faction with both the almighty Air and Life schools is Tarth. Ugh.  Looks like custom for me.

[edit]Oh snap, it looks like spell schools now cost 2 points in sov creation. Awesome. Looks like I might get my wish for rarer spells school, and having to pay more of a price to be good at both melee and magic.

good analysis

about combining warlock with summoner dunno

i really like the idea of having 2 totally differen playstyles with magnar being a hard nuker, ceresa and proci summoner

ceresa should work debuffing enemies and fighting with shadow magic while proci should be more supportive buffer, improving summons to tank/deal dmg instead of doing her alone

but yeah, like you say we have to understand what plans stardock has(anyway not hard to mod i think)

So a recent thread on Natural Leader got me thinking about this sovereign/faction and, sorry to pile on ya, but this vastly underrates Lord Relias. Assuming the Quest Map bug is fixed so that you don't get stuck with dud quests, I'd go as far as to say that Lord Relias might either at the top or at least contending with those in the lead.

Why? The synergy.

Let's start off with Natural Leader and the free champions. You're at a rather large advantage here as you can accumulate a rather sizable force of champions if you pursue the hero line early and reach them before your rivals. Now, in most cases, these additional heroes would prove to be dead weight as they cannot level effectively (although higher level ones would start somewhat decent). This is not a problem for Altar who, thanks to Wanderlust and Quest Maps, may produce in theory an infinite number of quests and thus XP isn't nearly as limited for them. Quests also tend to have the benefit of providing other resources like gold or items.

Then you have Air discipline. As Bingjack has already covered, this is one of the better Schools in the game, and your heroes will benefit from great Dodge while your units get bonus initiative.

Speaking of units, yours can level rather fast, gaining +10% xp by default and having a unique perk to raise it further. Now, this is by itself a very minor thing, because of course there's only so much to level on and.. OH WAIT. Quest Maps to the rescue again. But that's just a minor thing right? It's not like you'll be hitting up quests every moment of.. hold on. Don't we have a ton of extra champions laying around due to Natural Leader?

HOLD ON. Don't we have the faction trait 'Heroic', which grants us +1 FACTION PRESTIGE and +50 Influence per quest we complete? Do you see where I'm going with this? Lord Relias's faction provides a unique opportunity to snowball into an unstoppable warmachine of heroes while in the process making it so that all their cities level much much faster AND rake in massive influence. Arm heroes with the relatively early Lightning Hammers and their level will do most of the work to raise ATK. And then you have Henchmen. And more.

Does anyone disagree? Because from my vantage point, Relias is one of the best options right now.

Relias would be one of the major factions if Henchmen were less buggy. Those little guys add alot to an army, but I have trouble making custom versions of them to suit my style. The problem is that they have a weak blood trait, a weak weapon trait, a late game quest trait, and an early game defense against fire. That doesn't add up to most powerful faction. Making the blood better and perhaps giving them an entire set of special armor would set them up to be a powerhouse. That is assuming a fully customizable Henchmen is possible with grouping abilities. 

As to the mage specializations, I agree. Separate traits for nukes and summoners is a good idea, I was just doing some triage to have a simple solution for mage power. I would like each Sov trait to get some new abilities. As we analyze Sovs, it becomes all the more apparent blood, Sov and faction traits are not well balanced. Many Sov traits belong as faction abilities. Many blood traits are weak, but compensated by extremely powerful faction abilities. Some order needs to come to this area so that custom factions and Sovs can make as much sense as the vanilla ones. 

While bugs do sorta spoil Relias atm, you're not seeing the full potential here. I'm testing my theories right now and with a single quest complete I'm using the 50 influence to bring in nearly 500 gold (although I also split it for some of Pariden's tech). This is 1/2 of the Wealthy bonus with a single quest, and I still have 2 weaker quests nearby, and then if I can't find more I've trained heroes for Quest Maps. I'll continue testing but Heroic itself makes the faction incredible imo.

I've only used Relias a couple of times and I agree with you Madcatter, it is very easy to really milk those quest maps and level up Relias like crazy. I don't even think he needs the henchmen really. Buying up all the champs for free is very useful too but the big thing is the quest maps

The quest thing is probably in danger of being nerfed unless it can be reigned in. The AI doesn't buy shop items well yet. It also doesn't see the quest milking strategy. I will have to try that. 

like i explained quest problem is that you get quests too high against which you could struggle, at start

his unique gear sux long way, he is VERY weak as a fighter himself

so basically it depends on finding top champions that would allow him to steamroll everything, and that is what i call flaw mechanic, in some way

i mean every sovereign could do that, if i design a sovereign with all weaknesses and i find the best champions i can steamroll everything anyway, so its not a peculiar thing of relias

but i agree that given the chance and once you started questing then you can become unstoppable, but you guys seem to have never tried in real games, ai is not always dumb

there arent questing and exploring only

if you are at war you need an army, basic henchmen dont seem enough tbh

anyway i didnt try with new patch so  its subject to changes, for who tried last build how are new henchmen? what purpose they serve better? do you  think they need to come with you exploring or what?

the problem is its all random

in half my games ALL i have as quest is 2 weak and 1 medium

sometimes i have less

ofc when you start well you can steamroll, but any other leader given the same good start would just do better

thats the point of comparing, like i said many many times there is absolutely no problem to win the game, win the game is easy with EVERYONE, the point is just comparing things, in my understanding of the game and tries  the condition to make relias snowball would make anyone snowball, anyone who would also be MUCH MUCH stronger (basically everyone is stronger than relias as figher, even procipinee )

but im curious to test new henchmen and their funcionality

Henchmen have been better so far in my current game - they can have mounts at any rate, I haven't tested everything yet as I only just unlocked them. From my experience even using the bugged ones, they get quite powerful once you have levelled up a bit & offloaded spare magic weapons on them. They can level very fast & don't seem to suck XP away from heroes (or at least, hero+henchman level faster than two heroes together).

I've designed two mounted henchman classes now, the Ranger (mounted scout) and the Captain (defence-boosting cavalry commander, in anticipation of when I have the techs to field knights). I have another in mind, the Mayor, who I'm planning to quest with until level 4, get Path of the Governer, and then dump in my cities to help with construction and defence, freeing up my heroes for the front line. Time will tell how well they perform, but I'm optimistic.

The quest maps, converesely, haven't always paid off as they used to sometimes spawn broken quests - haven't yet seen if this has been fixed.

Relias can also become something of a badass once his air & fire magic gets levelled up - the tactical and strategic teleports and fire elemental are useful for everyone, but level 4 air also means he can teleport around the map pursuing quests, so I make it a priority.

I've always done well with Altarians even with all the bugs. They & Yithril are my two favourite factions so far.

Trying it in a Large/Hard game with all sovereigns active on the map. Going in a straight up production/research match, no war, I was neck and neck with the powerboard's leaders until Yithril started to run away recently. It's turn 184, Lord Relias is now LV28 (those leveling changes really helped ) and I've got another Champion at level 15 which is still quite a bit higher than the next highest sovereign (Irane at LV11). My prestige is 35 (~20 of that is from doing quests), divided among 5 cities for a base growth of +7 per turn (would be less than half that without the Heroic bonus). My Influence is over 800 even after spending a bunch early on. I have a unit of 14lv Lightning Hammer cavalry, group of 5, with 130 Attack. Now, while other races might be able to do a lot of the same things, I've never had this much growth with them, and I'd like to think the +35% combined Altaran xp blood/trait combined with the monsters from questing allowed those riders to reach their level much faster than would've been possible with another sovereign who'd get less XP and had to run around looking for fights instead of summoning them with Quest Maps. Now if only those dud quest spawns would get fixed...

yeah i finish my game with proci and new leveling is veeery fast now

i got her to lvl 24 i think (btw she is  a weak  mage even at that lvl lol )

proci 951 is INCREDIBLY OP, she was buffed in a unthinkable way  lol

apart from the empire being superior to anything new water elemental is REALLY strong

combine haste+slow+frostthing from ice elemental and if you are facing a big solo monster he wont move and i could kill slags really soon (until he 1 shot the elemental ofc)

i wont update since the major buff is already changed in 952

ai in general seems too much submissive as for now, i never got attacked  and didnt really bother to keep a good relationship

the op clearly does NOT define mages as nukers.

He instead focuses on the way they are "intended" to play according to the developers (as can be seen from initial point distribution and plot descriptions).

Magic can be used for only 2 things that are useful, it can be used to buff your melee tank champion/sov. Or it can be used for nuking. That is a balance problem. And the op correctly points out that trying to play what is clearly "summoner" sovs as summoners does not work.

However, the claim that fire is the only school worth taking is flawed because a supertank sov soloing everything single handedly is far more useful then a blasty mage type who burns all his precious mana on a single battle.

A proper sov avoids wasting picks on magic ranks and gets his buffs from champions. If you are really min maxing it, he spends points on getting life 3 book so he can eat the souls of his champions to steal their magic powers. However, this is clearly also touched upon by the op in his LORD MARKIN analysis.

The best sov's are of course the custom ones where you get to min max properly. But the op is clearly not trying to min max to the max, rather the is trying to play sovs "as intended" in "varying roles"

thnx you got the points right

anyway i was a bit too much fond of fire

after extensive more testing and playing and modding i have to say death is far more op as nuking (even though ceresa traits arent that good)

in my modded version i have nerfed a lot death aoe in fact (fire is balanced from the fact with my actual playsettings is impossibe to lvl up very fast)

as for caster vs melee (tank more likely) well one of the problems is still mana is too random, essence contributed to make it even more random, so apart from proci who swim in mana the others are often limited by mana, maybe many of them could kill everything easy IF they had X mana to spend every fight, that is not possible always, and when a mage has no mana he has not many alternatives

the fix to tanks being too op is quite easy anyway, how im playing now tanks are needed but cant solo much, buffing monsters solve this problem, tanks after the start take some dmg, if not helped by mages with buffs or nukes they cant make it

My old suggestion was to split units into "hero" "army" and "AoE" IIRC with equivalents for monsters. Significantly increase the QUANTITY of enemies in an army/swarm.

With the sov and champions being developable as either a hero or AoE (or a hybrid that is master of neither). as well as some of the greatest monsters (dragons and elemental lords should also be hero/AoE hybrids)

Heroes deal massive damage but only to 1 unit. AoE deal small damage but to all units in a tile.

So your hero deals 500 damage, but it can only kill ONE out of 500 units in a army/swarm stack per attack. the AoE deals 10 damage to EACH of those 500.

So an army of 500 units is highly effective against a hero because he needs 500 rounds to kill them. While an AoE type char can kill them in 1-3 attacks (depending on power of course) and have defenses against large groups (via spells reducing the damage of an individual attack or being a highly resiliant dragon or somesuch).

Heroes annihilate AoE types though. And of course, heroes could kill heroes and armies can kill armies. That would require mixed armies...

Also as of 0.952 XP is split based on how many units you have (or at least how many champions. Killing a bear gave my sov 2x the XP when done alone compared to when done along with a champion) so that means a solo sov rules again. It used to be an uberstack when XP was awarded equally without being split at all.

https://forums.elementalgame.com/416819

People threw a hissy fit at my calling it "rock paper scissors" approach though and called for mixed unit tactics which was EXACTLY what I actually called for. And incorrectly cited gal civ as a rock paper scissors game (it isn't).

balancing xp is really hard but i think the actual system is correct

xp need to be split

what is wrong in this system is the strenght of things

monsters should be MUCH MUCH more stronger

the incentive to grouping shouldnt be the gain/fight but the actual possibilty to win the fight

you should group because otherwise you cant kill what you encounter

like i said modding monsters works quite well, in the games im testing now i dont even consider going around in solo, the more the merrier! (ofc it depends on the champion i find and if i develop or not the army)