Conceptual Balance Mod 1.94 released!

[Fantomen]

Couldn't you mod all the tartarian versions to #nextshape into an affliction free copy of themself? it would be as if they came out the gate afflicted/insane but healed up during the first month, or would the afflictions carry over to that shape?

I don't really want that to happen mind you, I personally like the complexity and limitation involved with needing the chalice or GoH. As I think it's alright that only two nations can achieve it now that other lategame options are just as good.

[Valerius]

Originally Posted by Fantomen

Couldn't you mod all the tartarian versions to #nextshape into an affliction free copy of themself? it would be as if they came out the gate afflicted/insane but healed up during the first month, or would the afflictions carry over to that shape?

It's been a while since I messed around with this but I'm pretty sure the afflictions carry over. One very circuitous possibility I guess would be to shift them into a relatively harmless form that has recuperation and, taking into account how long it usually takes to heal feeblemindedness, have them stay in that form until shifting to their final tart form.

Originally Posted by Fantomen

I don't really want that to happen mind you, I personally like the complexity and limitation involved with needing the chalice or GoH. As I think it's alright that only two nations can achieve it now that other lategame options are just as good.

Having thought this over, I retract my statement about wanting an affliction free version of tart gate. I mean, it would be nice to have a spell that chooses a random unit from among a group - but it's not needed to balance tarts. When I got to talking about tarts I threw that onto the end of my post because for a long time I did want exactly such a spell.

My focus was in fixing tarts, but looking back it might have been more productive to focus on creating alternatives to them in the way that EDM (successfully IMO) did. Given my skill/interest in creating graphics I never would have come up with a nice mod like llama did but I could have created a quick and dirty version by repurposing existing units/sprites. In Momentum3 (I think the last of my modified tart games) I touched on this by making the elemental royalty non-unique SC options. What I never ended up doing was extending this out to the magic diversity side of things the way EDM has done.

In any case, I'd like to see a tart focused strategy be a valid one, even a strong one. But I don't think it should be a clearly optimal one. I don't think I'm the only one who got really tired of the chalice/GoH --> tarts (pick up WoM along the way) routine.

To throw a number out there, I'd say the cost of a GoRed tart could drop the current 28 (8D/20N) to maybe 20-23 total cost (split would of course depend on what restore soul was set at). Since the nerf to their HP they're not as fearsome as they once were as SCs but they can still fulfill that role and of course the magic diversity is the best in the game.

[Soyweiser]

Well, I think the nerf of shattered soul has hit them the hardest. It is also a mechanic I'm not really fond of. It is very thematic though.

[Valerius]

It's incredibly irritating. About the only thing in its favor is that it's thematic. Ok, so as a compromise how about reducing shattered soul to 5%, maybe 10%?

[Soyweiser]

Is that even moddable?

[Valerius]

Yeah, in one of the patches IW added a #shatteredsoul mod command. CBM actually uses it to reduce the tart level from a default of, I think, 25 to 20.

I ran a quick test, setting it to 5 and 10 and got a 6% and 11% crazy rate respectively so it should work fine.

[Tiavals]

According to the changelog, Scorpion Man should be a level 6 spell for Abysia, but it's level 8(at least on my computer). C'tis does have it as a level 6 spell on the other hand.

Anyone else notice this?

[Redeyes]

I did know about that particular difference, but the two spells are different in more ways than that.

The primary difference is that C'tis gets the scorpion man as a commander and Abysia receives it as a regular unit.

The Abysian version is also 12 gems in cost while it is 15 gems for C'tis.

[Tiavals]

Oh, interesting. Is it intended to work like that?

[Redeyes]

I never questioned it.