[Suggestion] Add tactical cool downs

from Elemental Forums

So I have been playing around with the spells for a while now, and I have noticed that I can not add a <cooldown> to my custom tactical spells. Every time I have tried the game crashes whenever the cool down is supposed to end. Currently, the only way for me to limit how many times a given spell can be cast is to strictly maintain specific mana levels. Consider the VM for example. Once these bad boys get up in lvls they can cast arcane doom like 2 times in the first round as they get 6 mana fairly quickly. If the spell had a 3 round cool down, these units couldnt just spam a single spell. Truthfully, i think even sov tactical spells should have cool downs. My late game sov can usually cast 3 chain lightning in a single round, which seems a bit hard core. It would make more sense that he would have to cast 3 different spells per round, each making him wait until at least his next turn to cast.

elemental
13,150 views 9 replies
Reply #1 from Elemental Forums Top

A cooldown would be GREAT.  I was always lothing of games where everyone has to spam fireball after fireball (afer fireball) the entire battle.  Then, evey battle after that.  This would eleviate the spam-AoE bordom of the game, and actually add more stratagey.

 

 

Reply #2 from Elemental Forums Top

Corp Por! Corp Por! Corp Por! Corp Por! =P

Cooldowns would be a huge improvement for unit/item special abilities, so you could use mana-free effects for trained units - among many other things.

Call them melee disciplines... stuff like the "Bash" spell that could be on the shield of your soldiers or a "Charge" spell, that would be a spell on their "horse" item. Battles are short but it stands to reason that the cavalry might get one good charge in...

Offworld Trading Company
Reply #3 from Elemental Forums Top

Good thinking, that's a even better reason Robert, to have a reason to use special abilities, and how about this: you get mana regeneration in a battle if you don't use the same spell (or type of spell) for a turn; maybe even MORE mana regeneration if you don't cast anything for a turn durring battle. . .

Reply #4 from Elemental Forums Top

I've been frustrated by the cooldown tag as well. The only use for it I can find at the moment that doesn't crash the game is to set it to -1 which makes the ability usable only once in the combat.

Reply #5 from Elemental Forums Top

many rpgs do this, even the old school ones.  Spell vs. Abilities/Skills.  Above mentioned bash and charge, or even things like rend armor or hamstring.  Some use "Stamina" or "skill points" or "energy" instead of mana (as well as cooldowns) In one of the tutorials (video) they used a summoned bear and the bear did a maul attack which stunned the opponent for a turn.  It was an ability, not a spell, but it cost mana.   I see your point about not having mana be the only limitation to prevent spamming.  k1 karma!  Another aspect to consider is deminishing returns.  Sometimes getting hit with the same thing over and over again builds up a tolerance against it.  I.E. stunning a stunned creature doesn't make sense, so they did things like "root" or "k.o." or "sleep" as well, afflict them with several things.  Or as above mentioned if you get hit with fireball after fireball after fireball, once you're on fire, you're on fire, you might burn a little faster but it shouldn't do as much damage)

Reply #6 from Elemental Forums Top

Whoops, I forgot to give Karma for this.  I hope they will consider that great idea for upcomming improvements and patches. k1

Reply #7 from Elemental Forums Top

Good One, have not tried adding but thought I saw it as a variable.

Maybe with the switch to Python we will be able to see the reason. Just as a thought have you tried something like 0.5 as the data, just thinking it might be a count up rather than a time between.

 

Lee

 

Reply #8 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Robert, reply 2
Cooldowns would be a huge improvement for unit/item special abilities, so you could use mana-free effects for trained units - among many other things.

Call them melee disciplines... stuff like the "Bash" spell that could be on the shield of your soldiers or a "Charge" spell, that would be a spell on their "horse" item. Battles are short but it stands to reason that the cavalry might get one good charge in...

Agreed that it's important cooldowns work, they're absolutely essential for creating good mana-free abilities that can't just be spammed. Not to mention the interesting choices they can create for regular mana-using spells/abilities as well.

Reply #9 from Elemental Forums Top

You can add essenceless abilities by using the Cooldown tag.  Unfortunately it is broken and will crash the game if set to anything other than -1, the setting for once per combat.

 

First strike is also a broken tag.  Its frustrating.