Why should the magic system be like X?

For instance I feel for a decent modern system with the premise that Elemental is written for, I'd like to see a system where:

1. The tactical and strategic systems are completely separate, with whatever power source in one as separate in the other. This would allow more combat spellcasting without sacrificing any build up for summoning/enchantments on the strategic level. This also separates the research of each so one could specialize in combat mages or strategic magics and the power sources for each, which would make magic take a larger share of the game play like it does in the title of the game. I'd especially like to see the focus of the shards increased so that enchantments and summons and strategic choices are limited by the shards inside a channelers control than the pure essence of casters.

2. I'd like to see more basis in the tactical game for magic based on the kingdom/empire choice. For instance each side starting with an attack spell of life or death (respectively). This spell would be cheap and more powerful against opposite forces, while less powerful against your type. For instance 'Life blast', 2 range, 0 mana, Half int damage, quarter int to any kingdom unit, full int to any empire unit. This appeals to me because it would put the at odds nature of Empires v Kingdoms into more conflict when you know you're more or less powerful against them.

3. The ability to purchase the all four elemental spellbooks at the beginning is too erratic when compared with the randomness of finding more crystals, and when you are able to research other spellbooks in the tech tree but not the elemental books you didn't buy at the beginning. I think this represents less of an issue as an opportunity as the game also lacks any epic feel when the great and powerful channelers finally face each other. Perhaps if a sovereign could only buy one elemental spellbook at the beginning of the game, but killing a rival stole their book, this would reflect the support of such a major enemy. Perhaps even the choice of element comes from faction choice, lending a tad extra flavor to each faction.

4. There needs to be some differences in the elements and schools of research. Opposition of the natures of magic are traditional, Death to Life, Earth Air, Fire Water, Magic v Nonmagical, though I think equal and opposite benefits might be a little stale and ripe for a new interpretation, such as fire strong against water and air but can do little except cause damage. water strong against fire and stone in similar fashion, but air might have the most variation while weakest against the other elements. Further the influence of the natures of spell types must be balanced and distinct. The foundation as I see it, Earth, Air, Fire, Water, Life and Death, are set in stone to the story concept. But I wouldn't cry seeing Enchantment, Combat, Summoning, and the rest be dropped even as concepts. As it stands with the loss of the summoning book for balance from 1.0, I wonder what was in it as so many of the summons are to be found in the elements, life, and death books anyway. Right now only the bear of Natures Ally is missed, and it has been locked until significant magic research opens that book, so significant that by the time it is gained it is lackluster. I think I'd rather see the enchantments and summons, and hopefully once we get them illusions, more mind effects, military strategics effects, necromancy, and more, be shuffled back into those six domains or combinations. For example Natures Bounty currently could be as easily an life magic or an earth spell as giving it to an enchantment domain. Rare is the spell that couldn't be fit into one of four elements and life and death, and normally justifying it creates two or more identical concept spells with different names and different specific details.

5. While I cringe seeing magic too systematic and written like a science of the game world, I feel it is especially bad to have magic appear so blandly methodically while researching lost techs is rather more erratic, which I find more interesting. Perhaps make learning the spells more erratic by copying the tech system. One choses to research magic from five branches, Life/Death and the four elements (not all active if something like 3 above is revised). Then once level 1 is researched, a selection of the possible level 1 spells can appear. Level 2 offering more of the level 1 and some level 2, research level 3 offering unchosen level 1, more level 2, and a couple level 3 choices. Further deepening the depth of spell choices is to keep some spells formerly of the enchantment, combat, etc books become tech magic researchable books of named past wizards and cultures, and scrolls found in questing, that unlock spells or just increase likelihood of rare spells to appear commonly. A system like this would also support having the crystal of x element in your control adds an extra point to research of that elemental branch of magic.

6. The look of the spellbook. Fairly minor stuff but as essential as icing on a cake. Perhaps if the spell book border could be made to change color/art as the research of the chose element and life and death, are researched/pursued. Perhaps the number of crystals a channeler has shrined becomes how many and what color crystals appear in the bordering.

Those are just some of my random thoughts.

 

Because they worked.

They were interesting.

It was worth using them.

Spell casters are currently utterly pointless.

So much tech and arcane development for +1 tech research once every 10 turns? Crappy summons which aren't worth as much as the wolves I could get through diplomacy?

And oddly enough, Earthquake which is worth 1 mana for god knows what reason.

I think Elemental should have his own magic system, custom tailored for game balance, the game engine and above all, AI limitation. I would like to see an AI able to understand and use magic in a concrete way, not just to nuke you on the Tactical battle.

 

That said, both MoM and Aow:SM had an incredibly robust magic system. One in wich spellcasting was a strategic choice, able to change the way the game was played (MoM more than AoW). You could FEEL your power altering the lands in those games, and magic sphere selection was a big part of the character creation and subsequent unique game strategies (again, in MoM more than in AoW).

 

By contrast, in Elemental, you chose spellbooks blindly, since you have no way to know beforehand wich shards you'll find in game and each of them is actually interchangeable in 90% of the game.

Also there is no unique feel to them, in MoM you could tell nature magic from death magic just by the effects of their spells, do you want to improve your kingdom into an impenetrable meat-grinder for invading armies? Go nature! You love debuffing and cheap tricks? Death magic!

In E:WoM, not even elemental resistance is contemplated, so you can fireball to death Flame Giants with impunity (Lame ).

 

 

I think some loose inspiration must be taken not only from those two games but also from other system, even Pen-and-Paper systems. We could have (as concepts, not necessarily individual magic books) abjurations (escalating magical defenses, not just +2DEF, but Contingency style magic, you pay a steep upkeep for said spell, and who cares if your sovereign dies in battle, he just respawns in your capital) Illusions (more debuffing, but also Tactical only summons!) countermagic (blue magic anyone?).

 

Landscape altering spells are missing also, not just an earthquake, but the ability to change my terrain to an Holy land: protection from foul magic and increased health regeneration for my troops. Or curse them with a chilling winter, penalty to movement and constant damage unless special countermeasures are taken.

I want to be able to cast an earth+fire spell and cover THE WHOLE WORLD in Volcanoes, then let both me and my enemies live with the results of my choice (ok, this one is directly taken from MoM, maybe a bug free version? Since IIRC the spell did not harm AI factions that used it...)

 

... Bah, sorry, not much of a coherent post here, just some loose concepts. My final idea is that an interely "original" magic system is impossible, you'll always find that this or that game had a similar spell, so why shouldn't we take inspiration from what already works ? The only thing to keep in mind is to avoid reproducing a single, particular sytem and instead incorporate a little bit from any source that seems adequate (and doable, of course)

I don't think it should be an exact copy of a system from another game, but generally there should be more 'depth' in the magic system than it is now, and using good ideas from other games (as well as some original ideas) is a good way to do it.

Ignoring any legal issue with ripping off others work exactly, the fact is that if they did copy it exactly it is plagerised work. One can paint like Picaso but as big as he would get he would always be in Picaso's shadow. Elemental, as the spiritual heir to MoM deserves something at least as good but still not a rip off. Rather than keep beating the horse on what it is currently doing wrong, and how it should be like MoM, why not idea on how it should be BETTER than MoM. What did MoM have that MUST be kept, and where could it be improved for a multiplayer strategy game of todays standards. What specially made it great and where did it lack that shouldn't be copied.  

There is no point arguing over Earthquake being cost 1. The very concept of the spell is almost completely strategically flawed as it doesn't damage units in the area but it does destroy enemy buildings which are nearly always better seized than destroyed. There is a crap load of other balance issues to be worked out before the low cost on a high level spell matters.

The entire point of this thread is about what is needed for the magic system as a whole, not just what individual spells are missing or unbalanced. There is no use wheel aligning a a broken car. This is about spitballing ideas to make the car work in the first place.

No need to appologise Divvu80, you raise some points, and I'd like to know what you think is the reason MoM and AoW were robust and interfacted to the strategy of gaming. I am not wanting to redesign the wheel but build a better wheel. That requires knowing what worked and failed in other games and building up. Ultimately it will never be original to some as Magic systems in games are not new.

Now my turn to ramble to make my point. While I enjoyed Sins of a Solar Empire I found it lacking because of the fundamental nature of the game was three factions, the War favored Vasari, the Influence heavy Advent, and the Economic TEC, I found the game was far too resourced based so TEC was the strong faction especially in the early release. For me, if Elemental has a solid magic foundation that could make an alternative resource path, balance could be made for genuinely different tactical choices rather than build the best resources and buy the best troops as the only winning tactic.

That players bring up the MOM system is to be expected because it has elemental spells, too, and unlike in the Elemental game, they had actual ties to the combat system, such as life spells to specifically hinder / destroy undead/chaotic (evil) creatures.

Elemental is somewhat lacking the "elements" bit. Right now the shards (well, once that system is fixed/implemented) are only a damage multiplier for generic, physical damage.
That's so terribly wrong.

And it could be done, even now. All units need a hidden stat for Elemental Affinity.
Simply a damage modifier.

Such as a fire giant having
Elemental.Affinity.Fire = 0,4
Elemental.Affinity.Water = 2,0

A normal soldier would have
Elemental.Affinity.Fire = 1,0
Elemental.Affinity.Water = 1,0

These can be used for the damage calculation (or debuff duration or whatnot) for elemental spells so a fire spell is always multiplied by the target unit's Elemental.Affinity.Fire.

See? That would be even better than the old MoM system! Choke on that, MoM fans! =P

 

Ideally, units would have separate magic and physical resistance but with a modifier like that, it's practically superfluous.

• You can have magic immunity or resist buffs/debuffs by having an enchantment that alters Elemental.Affinity.Water +5 or * 1,5
• You can have "magical creatures" that are very resistant to magic but weak physically. Beholders?  Just give them low magical modifiers all across the board.
• You want zombies that are easy to dispatch/control with magic but hard to hack down? Give them high defense but high modifiers for magical damage....
• Undead that disease you with melee attacks and make you more susceptible to death magic...

 

 

Simply put, magic should do a lot of "other" things. We just have very "plain" effects. Give us some realm-wide buff/debuff, alter the flow of time, hell let me take my chances with dangerous experiments!

Let me enchant magic items (admittedly, planned in an expansion IIRC), let me summon foul demons that I cannot control (Fall from heaven has something similar, you can summon a powerful demonic/angelic civ that, while being allied with you [you can actually even switch off and play them!] has his own goals!)

 

Give each sphere similar but slightly different "utility" effects, you could have a teleport spell in the air book, but also a spell that allows me to travel "anywhere 20 [earth] tiles from where I stand" in the earth book! How about a water walking spell? Then build on that foundation and give us something in order to chose earth OVER air OVER fire OVER water.

One of the most wonderful thing about MoM is how the specific tailoring you gave to your spellcaster in the beginning would affect the whole game. This should be copied. Not single spells or effects but (as Sid Meier says ) a "Serie of Interesting choices".

One thing I remember about MoM were powerful, and inspiring, world effects. That is one thing I really think we need more of.

ONe example:

Armageddon. It turned land into volcanoes, had a high upkeep, but the more volcanoes, the more mana income you had. Eventually the spell was self-powering, and if noone stopped you, you'd have unlimited mana. It was a game-ender spell... or a you-ender spell.

Now, in Elemental, we have spells to cripple a town. But I have not seen any dramatic world-changing effects. Shroud of Death, where, instead of forests spawning animals, they'd spawn werewolves and undead that are more directly aggressive and powerful (and not only outside city influence), Blessings of Gaia (earth) - makes all farms (not just the casting kingdom) doubly productive, Earthdelve (same for (some types of mine), etc. etc.

Font of Crystal (creates a crystal fountain artifact that creates 2 crystal per turn, works as a mine.).

Strength of Heroes - strength and defence boost to all 'basic' kingdom troops.
Unholy Strength - strength and constitution boost to all 'basic' empire troops.

City of Death (death magic): Can suddenly create certain undead troops.
City of Life (life magic) doubles prestige and increases base constitution of troops made there.

Domain of Chaos: All units gain a random mutation.
Domain of Order: All units gain a training bonus.

Basically, things that has either a limited or global effect on the world. Things a little more suited to fire the imagination. Because that's important in a game like this; that's the main inspiration behind magic - it fires the imagination.

And yes, you would need a disjunction effect, and some global effects would prevent some or all others from being cast, etc.

 

 

 

Yeah! That was the name of the Volcano spell I was remembering before!

I for one would like the community to start making their own spells for the game...

I got a bit angry in another thread and said this:

thread after thread saying turn Elemental into a sequel to an older game.  this thread more specifically then others has an ironic title for that.  FIX Elemental by turning into NOT Elemental.  That makes NO sense.  Then it WOULDN'T BE Elemental.  Stop trying to talk Brad and his company into re-making other games you loved and let him make his own game, and maybe join him in loving it too.  If you want the other games re-made then go to THEIR forums and leave Brad - and us - alone.

Link: https://forums.elementalgame.com/395298/page/1/#2757838 - to which the basic reply was "because that's what we want"

but as to an idea for some magic in Elemental I also made a post saying this:

In response to the original poster:

Because if you can't make something innovative and good, you should stick to proven and good. From what I gather Elemental's system is neither good nor innovative.

Some great replies from everyone,

Robert Hentschke seems to have a real handle on that affinity idea that could clean up the basic tactical to a playable level, briliant but that really is more a patch and doesn't address a foundation for more than math changes.

Hybridvitae, heh that was the post that inspired me to start this one to try and see the basic building blocks of a new magic system rather than patch a lackluster one.

Actually borsuk, my concern is that proven and good isn't enough, especially for a game that has had such a rocky start. Why settle for proven and good when there is so much detail out there proven and great should be possible, or if we are ambitious enough to break down what worked in the past and apply it to the foundation of the strategic game we might find something more innovative than a better UI to add to proven and good.

Khardis, divvu80 and Robert, as I understand it what you felt MoM had was grander scope of spells and super powerful ones as well as smaller scale tactical applications. While I can see the appeal I wonder how it kept the magic balanced against the strategic of armies?

Also while my understanding of the code is rather limited but aside from tactical battlefeild manipulation, I would have thought most of these grand area spells could be implimented in the game code as is. Some of the spells you guys propose would seem awesome and actually deployable, if a little cleverness needs to be used to tweak the spells to the rest of the game. For instance why couldn't one have a high level fire spell that raised a volcano, it's cost lowered by the number of fire shards present. Then this volcano acts as a fire shard itself (lets call it a sympathetic boost to present fire shards), empowering the wizard to make the next volcano for cheaper... perpetual tornado for air, sinkholes to the depths of the planet for earth, and maelstroms lakes for water.

Similar with undead or summoned demons of death magic made from spells cast on towns or even to raize towns in sacrifice to summon a demon horde.

Is it just that the initial content is serverely lacking but not it's potential?

Well, I'm positive many of the peoples around think that Elemental HAS a lot of potential. But potential is not enough. The armoire standing behind me has the POTENTIAL energy to kill me, but a reasonable, directed force is needed to start a reaction...

 

For example, as you say many of the effects we're describing could be doable by a skilled modder, but then would the AI be able to use them? Probably not.

 

I repeat what I feel most, it's not the single effects from a particular system (AoW, MoM) that we must seek to reproduce, but the FEELING that more polished magic system have. Magic should be something where specializing and generalizing has meaning, and an integral part of the strategy of each game.

 

when you think a new car you dont put 5  wheels or 13

you start with 4

there is a reason why you use 4

 

videogames ARENT different

 

there are solid reasons why in a RPG there are certain classes, why in a shooter there are weapons etc etc

 

sure you can create many new things but starting from the goals reached in the past

 

you dont invent a new MMORPG ignoring what WOW did, it would be just stupid

 

Well, I would say it more like:

 

There were people in the past who had to design very similar systems.  Ignoring what they did is highly arrogant.  There is nothing wrong with re-using accumulated expert knowledge.

 

One of my major concerns is marginal spells.  It is much preferable, from strategy game POV, that the player is presented with a smaller array of spells all of which he wants desperately to cast but has to prioritize based on casting skill/mana pool.  A lot of the times it feels like content is added just to pad the game.

 

Second concern is the very generic feel of spells.  Compare something like E:WoM "Brilliance" to MoM's "Stream of Life".  ( Don't get me wrong, MoM had plenty of marginal spells)

 

Third concern, magic realms need to be different.  Radically different.  MoM did this pretty well.

 

Last, which is more of a preference, I think it would be great if magic books could be found adventuring (like in MoM).  This would also need depth rating of every realm (like how many books of that realm you have)

Remember the proverb "Good artists copy, great Artists steal" - the essential meaning is that today innovation does usually not mean starting from nothing. You do not want to re-invent the wheel (or you may end up re-inventing the square wheel - forgoing a good existing solution for a self-made one... which does not work) Rather you should filter out the good parts of existing things, and then refine them and improve upon them with your own creativity.

Let me give you a simple example. The magic system in MoM. It was functional and reasonable fun. Let's mix it up and expand it. Keep the global pool for the strategic level spells, but let your sovereign and other magic users cast tactical spells from their personal pools and have those refill faster by "drawing" magic from that global pool. The idea that different shards augment different spells is cool. How about a magic workshop that lets you combine spells? Firebolt + Earth projectile = Ball of Fire that explodes into shrapnel. How about being able to build magical "batteries" to store even more magic?

You get my drift - use what is proven to work and then take it to the next logical level. Or don't... then you end up with a magic system like Elemental has right now

Ceterum autem censeo, 1DN esse delendam

Personally, I'd rather see a system more akin to the old Dark Sun D&D campaign setting (or some aspects of it at any rate). It's a setting that has a lot in common with Elemental in style and tone. The relationship between clerics and Witch-Kings is very similar to that of Sovereign and imbued champions. Likewise, the role of magic in the setting is as much dramatic and destructive as anything else.

There are a few facets of the MoM magic system that I do not believe would benefit elemental:

• Ability to cast tactical spells in any combat regardless of whether your sovereign is present.  This made sense when your wizard was up in his tower; less sense when he's an actual unit on the map.  Plus, with the ability to imbue champions, you can usually have magic wherever you really need it if you plan appropriately.  I like treating a wizard as a resource that can't be everywhere at once.
• Spell research traded off against mana generation and casting skill.  I like the spell research system being slightly disentangled from the casting system.  I found I frequently would pump a bunch into resarch to get high level spells while never having the mana to cast stuff early in the game.  Seperating the systems allows you to experiment and potenially enjoy some of the lower level spells, instead of feeling like you're just slowing down your path to the high level stuff.
• Random spells in your spellbook.  I have a distaste for systems that essentially block me off from strategic options without me having any say in it.  If anyone every played the regretable MOO3, it was remarkably aggravating when no mining techs showed up early in the game.  Similarly, it'd just be aggravating to be playing a wizard who I'd decided should focus on summoning or city enhancement, and then it turns out my spellbook is missing a key summon or enchantment.
• Mana as a resource to be gathered like gold or food.  It worked for MoM, but this is a different setting.  Magic is rare in this world and you shouldn't be able to just harvest it like wheat.  Channelers are a source of magic as are the shards.  It can stay this way.  When magic is derived from territory (the nodes in MoM), big empires have the advantage in casting.  Big empires don't need any more advantages in Elemental.

Of course, MoM also did many things right that I think should be borrowed/adapted to fit in the Elemental context:

• Spell upkeep as a restricion on enchantments/summons.  I like having a choice of whether I'd like to have one fire giant or several familiars.  Not all enchantments are equal, so it doesn't make sense for all to have the same upkeep cost (one enchantment slot).
• Multi-turn spell cast times.  Casting time is one knob that can be used to tune excessively powerful spells.  When everything is cast in one turn, you're putting a cap on the impact magic can have on the world.
• Frequent availability of tactical spells.  Seperating casting skill from mana just feels right for a wizard in an epic turn-based setting.  We don't need to part and parcel copy the casting skill system.  Something similar could be accomplished through a very high mana regeneration rate.  My channeler or caster champion should be able to contribute to battles as frequently as a melee champion would.  Maybe that means tuning tactical spells to have less devastating potential, but I want to be able to do *something* in just about every battle my sovereign fights.
• Distinct flavors for the different spell books.  A caster who specializes in air magic needs to play the game differently from one who specializes in earth.  This is important for the replayability of the game.  This is also contingent upon magic having a greater impact on the game in general.

There are some new things that could be added as well to take advantage of other strengths of Elemental:

• Trading of spells.  The diplomacy system in Elemental is far more robust than MoM.  You're dealing with other channelers, so you may as well add an additional form of currency to the table.  I also see spell trading as more interesting than tech trading, as it is more common for different leaders to possess very divergent sets of spells (or even have access to them).
• Magic in unit customization.  If I specialize in air magic, maybe I want to make a faster swordsman, or electrify his blade.  It opens up some fun options, I think, and really ties features together in an interesting way.  Maybe even, dare I say it... customize your own summons.

As my opening post shows, the intent of the thread is to disect the nature of the successful predeccessors of E:WoM to make a successful new system. It was against posts out there that consistantly start with "Use the system from x" where x was MoM AoW, etc. These threads devolved into what arguements of the current failings, but not what should be learned from the successes of the past to make the next better system.

Yes, let us learn how many 'wheels' the past successes used to make this new 'car', but if some previous 'cars' (games) had great system, what made them great?  Where did they do thier best? What of thier best perfectly fits the nature of the rest of E:WoM, and what might the nature of E: WoM change of the great lessons of the past to suit it?

So many posts are only 'Elemental should be more like x' and not giving a single detail of what makes them good or what should be learned or what should be avoided. Not ripping on you sagittary, I have totally felt the dark sun vibe Elemental has, but exactly what parts of Darksun did you find "dramatic" that we can steal the concept of to make a better game here?

Malekith's post has some excellent points on what of MoM worked and what have difficulty fitting and balancing into Elemental. Several of the Pro points are similar to hinted updates from the Dev's on revising the magic already.

I think that the changes being discussed in this thread are unrealistic in scope for a game that has already been released.  The AI, which is just now coming into it's own would be useless if the changes in the way magic worked were too drastic.  I'd like instead to see some helpful tweaks that don't fundamentally change every aspect of magic in the game, such as tweaking the concepts of essence, spell maintenance, and the impact of shards on the game.  I just want the magic to be a little more fun to use and research.

I think this is a silly question:

The reason its being compared to AoW and MoM is because the spell system in Elemental is extremely similar to those games, especially AoW 2. It is so similar that it is easy to see when AoW has stuff that Elemental does not. This is why the direct comparison is so easy to make, and why its relevant. If Elemental wants to have a unique Magic system, fine. Currently its a copy paste of AoW with a few small changes and they should either match what AoW did well or find a different way to do things that's completely different.