Re: How to mod Angels to not be wimps.
 

The Angelic ost is also a bit costly because it can be projected anywhere. I would vote for some more HP though, like a tiny +4

Re: How to mod Angels to not be wimps.
 

I take it you have not tried this. I have. They do not work. I had a thread about it some time ago. I figure that the horn has an MR check it's the only way I can explain the total non-factor that is the horn of the harbringer. It's useless. Does nothing. Zip. Clearly you should try things before claiming that they fix everything.

I know it was bad enough just with what I was showing. I did not want to make it seem like I was piling on. Of course that is how it works in game.

Doesn't that require the devil to fail a moral check? I don't think that will be happening any time soon.

This would help substantially. Of course if the angels can hit it will be an intersting battle. The angles will probably 1 hit the devils and the devils will one hit the angles. Weird battles to be sure.

HA. I have to totally agree.

I think that is it! Perhaps it could be implemented as follows: a second attack which does some minimal damage ( let's say 4 points ) x3 against devils/undead with a good sized area effect ( like 5 squares or something ) with no range. Much like the harbinger's horn ( but less powerful ). If you can mod 2nd attacks it should be brain dead simple to implement. That along with the +4 attack would make them USEFUL ( but perhaps not cost effective ) against devils.

Interesting.

Perhaps good can at least hold off evil in the eternal war!

Re: How to mod Angels to not be wimps.
 

Devils have built-in weaknesses in the various spells and weapons that are extra-effective against them. Angels are vulnerable to everything that affects magic beings, though, but devils don't generally have those themselves.

Angels are generally sacred, though, so if you are really "holy enough" http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif, you may be able to make up the difference. It seems thematic that pretender gods with weak bless effects would have a harder time using angels to full effect. Similarly, perhaps during an ascenscion war, demons do tend to have the upper hand in some ways. Once someone is a real god, perhaps their bless bonus lets angels or whatever minion they choose take care of things like demons. In other words, I'm not sure that we'd necessarily expect angels to be as dangerous as the better demons. Seems more like a thematic question that could be answered either way. I'd be interested to hear what Illwinter might have to say about why they chose the values they did.

Seems though like one thing the Angels could really use which would be thematic, would be a defense that only worked against demons.

PvK

Re: How to mod Angels to not be wimps.
 

To summarize!

Were I to mod them I would probably do the following:

1) Attack +4
2) 2nd melee attack. Area attack let's say 1. Damage 4 x5 versus undead/demon.
3) An air shield would be nice. It's kind of a shame that they die to arrows like that. either 50% or 75%.

Would I summon such a troop? I think so. They are good against the most common SC's undead/demons. And anything that counters what we see a lot of today ( bane lords gone wild! ) is, IMO, a good thing.

Heck them being remotely targetable could be a *real* boone as they could potentially KILL the solo undead SC/Demons that are running around all of the time. Horray.

Hell it would even be nice if there was another Version of the spell that worked like Ghost Riders in that the host would go away after the combat. It would, of course, cost considerably less than the current spell. Perhaps 10 astral pearls.

Re: How to mod Angels to not be wimps.
 

Ok #3 is optional. It may make them *too* good ( but it's really not a big thing ).

I think that #1 and #2 combined would make them quite excellent at what they are supposed to do: kill those unholy things without sigifigantly empowering them against normal troops ( which is the only thing that they are even a little good at today ).

Re: How to mod Angels to not be wimps.
 

I wonder if you've ever seen a tartarian in the game? The typical one has 150-250 HPs, making it almost impossible for the angel to kill in 1 hit. The tartarians on the other hand only have to hit the angel once, and also have a variety of magic paths they can use.

In addition, you say "if you run a fire 9/10 bless" : well, yes, _IF_ you do. How many people run fire blessings for the effect on angels? And even with an unholy, er, holy, attack rating, the angels still die like holy flies to many forms of attack, especially magical.

Re: How to mod Angels to not be wimps.
 

In my Caelum SP game (circa turn 60) I've summoned tartarians and got the monstrum as the first one. Very impressive. Once I finish kitting it out it'll eat almost anything in the game as a light snack. Heck, even freshly summoned with no gear whatsoever it'll rip up most things. Boron needs to take another hard look at Zen's SCQR.

Re: How to mod Angels to not be wimps.
 

Tartarians are very, very nasty. A Tartarian Cyclop has full slots, loads of hp, decent base prot, generally nice stats, and Earth-4, which allows Invulnerability and Iron Will for starters. The Tartarian Manticores have even more hp and flight, but far fewer slots and different (2?/2?) magic. Still, they cost not only Conj-9 research, but death-7 to cast, 10 death gems per, usually 20 nature for Gift of Reason, and additional time w/ Chalice / Gift of Health to remove feeblemind and other fun afflictions.

But yeah, an angel will have trouble with one. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

One bit: Archangels, Harbingers are unbounded. Their demonic / devilish rival nobility are capped, and don't benefit from divine backing unless made into prophets or given Shrouds. Weak gods, weak angels; this makes a lot of sense to me. It's also thematic with the usual story lines of Good being under siege and seriously threatened by Evil. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Re: How to mod Angels to not be wimps.
 

Uhm that's true but a single devil TROOP can eat a harbringer or an archangel. It may actually take two devils TROOPS depending upon how the battle goes.

The change of a modest increase in attack and an area effect holy attack as a 2nd attack would make the angels worth while as a hard counter to devils/undead. They would still be inefficient vs. normal troops which is ok by me.

As a hard counter they should PROBABLY be very cost efficient against the troop they are going to counter. I mean that is the way that counters are supposed to work. But I would live with +4 attack and the holy attack.

It would also be nice to have a similar hard counter to magical units. It looks quite a bit like ether warriors are supposed to fit that bill, however they lack the skills to consistantly hit and they are not remote targeted. They are also hampered by their 1 strategic movement.

However I would not want to destroy the spell as it stands. Perhaps a slight bump to their attack rating ( perhaps +2 or so would do it ). And two new spells one that would be remote targeted ( and more expensive on a per-unit basis, perhaps 8 ether warriors and some leader, for 50 gems or so ) and a ghost rider like spell for 10-15 gems that would be the normal load of 15 warriors+1 ether lord.

This would make astral summons ( which are currently ... uhm ... lacking ) the summons of "hard counters."

Re: How to mod Angels to not be wimps.
 

Definitely slap more HP on the angels, equal to the devil's maybe? 100 FR would also be fitting. They already have FR 50, and the Flambeau should give them another 50%, but because it's intrinsic instead of an item, it does not, and the archangel will fry his minions half the time with falling fires, fireballs and other offensive fore spells.

Blood summons are available far earlier and are much cheaper and use a type of magical resource generally not suited to much more than summoning nasties, while the angels are expensive, die quickly and the resources generally are much better used elsewhere. It is quite telling that you generally need to drop at least two Angelic Hosts on a moderately large indie province (at indie strength 7) to conquer it with them, and even then you will lose two to three of them, most likely because the Archangel will flashfry his minions with fire magic instead of laying the smackdown on the enemy.

Tight now, the angels are a completely losing proposition almost every time, unless you have insane amounts of astral pearls to spare or find a conjuration bonus site like The Crypt Underneath or The Ultimate Gateway. With the latter one, they become a viable option, but that site is very rare.

Edi