Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

Hopefully, I should be able to provide MP Grendelkin feedback soon.

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

Ooh cool!

Hope he lays the smack down on your opponents.

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

Emberlord = Balrog ?

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

It's sort of been mentioned a few times. See:

Here,
here,
here,
and here.

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

So it is a bad thing if you post without reading the thread like 3 others did ?

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

llamabeast:

I will put some of your summons into use soon too, in few days probably :)

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

I hope you won't :p (Je suis david sur l'autre forum)

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

An idea - appeared some time ago. In a description of the General of the West it's said that the previous Pantokrator made an immortal body for him so that he wouldn't be slain again. Is there a possibility that a new Pretender will manage to duplicate this work for his own ends? ;) I mean something like Earth/Astral? spell, Enchantment 8-9, making a new body similar to the said General, with some Earth magic and possibly 1-2 randoms. Unfortunately current modding commands don't allow transformations of existing commanders so it will actually be a summon, but I think that according to background text Enchantment would be more thematic.

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

A good idea, especially because there aren't currently any earth-astral thug/sc chassises?

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

Golems ?

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

Sorry, maybe then this should be done by some other path(s). Still, I'd say that Earth is probably a good base for such a spell.

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

Okay, so some discussion on this mod has been happening on the other forum. Rather than split the discussion between two threads, I've decided to try pasting the comments here. Hopefully the people frequenting that forum won't feel too aggravated at having to post here (those who are allowed to of course). It's quite possible I would be better to just move this thread there, but we will give this a go.

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

Thanks for the (pasted) comments guys.

Firstly, I gave the Cyclops and Asynja powerful magic largely on thematic grounds, and to make them viable alternatives to Tartarians. The fact of the matter is I haven't played the end game for a year or so, and shockingly enough have never fully explored the full potential of Tartarians. Er, I guess you could argue that makes me a bad person to make this mod! In any case it makes such feedback very valuable.

With regard to the cyclops - options are:
- Reduce his Earth magic by 1
- Make him more expensive
- Make him harder to summon
- Increase the magic of the Elemental Royalty by 1 (I have long thought this should be done anyway, but perhaps it's outside the scope of this mod?)

Similar options apply to the Asynja. Maybe I could reduce or eliminate her access to Earth magic, so she can't cast Rain of Stones? Seems to me a straight air mage is not such a threat.

Also, forgive my failing memory, but isn't high earth and air access quite common on Tartarians? I would like Earth and Air summons to be better for those paths than death summons.

Finally, I'm considering adding glamour to the Asynja, if I can. Does that sound monstrously overpowered?

I have a new version pretty much done, but it can wait for some additional feedback, so now is an excellent time for people to offer their thoughts. Thanks!

PS Gregstrom, I didn't understand your post. Maybe I am displaying tragic incomprehension, but who is being sarcastic?

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

I'm pretty sure zztop^H^H^Hcat was being sarcastic. As you rightly comment, one flavour of Tartarian Cyclops has E3A2 - it's a very popular choice for GoR and RoS spam as a result. 1 time in 4 35 Air gems gets you a RoS caster (A2E2 and non-0 enc isn't enough for RoS spamming) with half the hits and none of the resistances of a Tartarian. IMO, that is probably sarcasm. Commenting that you sometimes get A4 this way when you can guarantee yourself A4 by spending 25 Air gems added to that impression.

Asynja and Cyclops (also a great candidate for RoS spam) both have the advantage of reliability over Tarts, and I'm not sure how that balances out. You're always getting a usable commander and caster, even though neither one is guaranteed to cast RoS out of the box. Perhaps the Cyclops having a reasonable chance of E5 is a little much, but I think it's too soon to be sure. There are so many other uses for 35 E gems that some nations will probably prefer to run a Tart factory until they can GoR an E4 Tart cyclops instead.

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

Hi, llama. First off, thanks very much for this mod.

As far as the cyclops goes, what about a 50% chance of an additional E, 25% chance of A, and 25-50% chance of F? This reduces their abilities in E magic, but even more importantly reduces the chance of the powerful AE combo. The only tart guaranteed that combination is one of the two cyclops - but you've only got a 1 in 7 chance of getting him. You could get that path combo on another chassis but it might not have full slots.

You could do something similar with the Asynja. Maybe a 50% chance of an additional A, 25% chance of E, and another 10% chance of AEB? I'd be hesitant to give her glamour, though. I think that stealth is a powerful ability on an SC, glamour even more so. It would probably be better to get more reports from games using the diversity mod before doing this.

As far as pricing goes, I can see it going a little higher on the price of both of the units in question but since the goal of the mod is to have viable alternatives to tarts I think they have to be cost effective. If the prices on the diversity mod summons get too high, I think people will still feel the Chalice/GoH and tart combo are too good to consider other options (I think it's ok if tarts are still the most cost effective option - as long as the alternatives are close enough to be worth considering).

As regards elemental royalty, you could add to their magic paths (I think a random would be better than another point in the path they already have) but it might also be worth considering giving them better summon ally abilities or something along those lines. Or maybe a useful onebattlespell that might even be outside their magic paths. I think something like that would make them still worth summoning even with comparable SC/spellcasting chassis available. And I don't think it's outside the scope of the mod at all - heck, you could also make treelord's worthwhile at the same time.

On another note, I'll be very interested to see what people have to say about the Grendelkin. My first impression was the same as rdonj's from earlier in the thread. No magic, but incredible stats...

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

I agree that the problem is that these summons outshine Elemental Royalty too much. I'd say the problem is the same with Emberlords (especially!) and Ents. As a way to fix I think that making Asynja's magic more random is probably quite good. Considering Cyclops I am not sure that Air magic is really thematic for him. Maybe make Fire/Earth random? Glamour for Asynja, while thematic, makes her actually better than ASynja Pretender - I don't think that's as it should be.
Considering fix of Elemental Royalty, I' d agree with Valerius that some thematic #onebattlespell can go a long way here. Another possibility is, of course, gem generation...

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

Why not just cut the cost of Elemental Royalty by 10 gems? Although I do like the #onebattlespell idea...

As Valerius's point out, you have only 1/7 chance to get a E3A2 Tartarian Cyclops per cast, 4 times in 5 you need extra 15N to GoR them(so 27 gems in total), and you have to have GoH or the chalice to make them usable. With earth boots 3 in 4 asynjas will be RoS caster, the other can cloud trapeze then cast fog warriors and wrathful skies w/o any equipment. IMO it affects end game even more than cyclops do.

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

Just for fun, I've got a grendelkin picture. Hardly ideal gear, really... this one exists to kill armies of 100+ warhammer ogres. As you can probably tell, it hasn't quite gotten that far yet. My ideal anti-sc would have quickness, probably dual swords of swiftness or anti-undead weaponry, and an insane attack skill. That's an e9n4 shroud it's wearing by the way, and it has 36 regen a turn. If you have anything resembling a decent bless, a shroud makes a lot of sense to slap onto one of those. Imagine one with W9/Fx/Nx :)

Also, I am all for boosting the elemental royalties, moreso than I'm behind nerfing the end game diversity summons. Although I think taking air away from the cyclops makes sense. I would leave the royalties still more expensive. They should be good enough to be a prize though to have now. I kind of like the idea of making them generate gems, but that would probably make them hoarded too much. Giving them #onebattlespells seems like a much better idea, since they'd have to be used more aggressively. They could also potentially receive hp boosts.

I would have no problem with them having things like earthquake, living earths, storm... not sure what to do with pedoseion. Blood rain?

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

If they're doing #onebattlespells, I'm seeing definitely one guy casting Curse of Stones, one Heat from Hell, the aquatic Water one Friendly Currents, the amphibious one Rain/Quagmire(both!). More quality-of-life spells than anything else. Also Pedoseion should #onebattlespell Iron Bane, ugh.

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

Tartarians are spammed - sooner or later you will get a usable Cyclops, and you get a lot of other useful stuff along the way. As I said, the advantage Asynja gets is reliability - most casts will get you a unit that can do a low-fi impression of a Tart Cyclops. It costs more, and isn't quite as accessible as Tartarians. If you think you aren't paying enough of a price for that reliability, fine. What should you be paying instead?

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

Why not remove magic from the cyclops (and keep a low cost), with high natural prot and all slots, fire resist and fear, it would still be a very good SC chassis, without stepping on the toes of the cyclops pretender nor tartarians.

By the way, I think Tartarians should cost more, but this is another problem.

If you really wants the cyclops summon to keep some magic, just E2 (with maybe a 10% random E1/F1) would be enough for summon earth power and some other buffs, and it would keep the troll kings from being obsolete.

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

I don't really think removing the earth magic from the cyclops is necessary. Sure, maybe cutting it down a bit as you suggested later could work But there's also no real reason to get rid of it, so far as I can tell. I don't think stepping on the toes of tartarians is a big issue for this mod, either. The entire point is to allow more endgame options than you currently have with tartarians. Having a strong earth mage doesn't even really step on the toes of tartarians, and it's thematic for a cyclops to have e anyway. Even so, I would care to wager that the cyclops is not nearly as good as a tartarian anyway, even though it still costs more.

I also don't see why it would be a problem to make the cyclops just out and out better than troll kings. Cyclops have much higher requirements in basically all ways, troll kings are more of a midgame spell as opposed to the cyclops late game. As far as I'm concerned there's no reason they can't be to the troll king as tartarians are to bane lords.

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

It would affect the use of the mod if it adds things to the game, or if it changes things in the game.
Solo players tend to be all for mods that add to the game. MP players for mods that "fix" things in the game.

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

I've tried out the mechanical giant now in MP. It makes for a quite nice thug, but it could be a tad cheaper. 20 earth gems would be more ok I think.

I used it with boots of quickness, dual frost brands, ethereal robe and flying carpet. Then I gave him some mechanical men as bodyguards. Made for a really nice flying raiding party.

Also great as a battlefeild thug/blocker with just quickness boots and two good weapons. Nice to combine with mixed elemental evocations and fatigue spells. I was LA Caelum so used them with lightning, freezing mist and rigor mortis.

Overall I think the Mechanical giant is well balanced and fills a niche yet unoccupied, but as I said slightly too expensive. Good work.

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

Well, it seems that Warhammer mods are quite popular in MP, too. And even in SP I prefer to have alternative to Tartarian spamming. So it looks like both parts of your statement are at least overgeneralized. ;)

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

Hmm...I just loaded this mod for an SP game and noticed one of the random nations is called Endgame Diversity Mod...

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

It's just so you can easily test the summons by recruiting them.

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

Too lazy to paste content. Heres my thoughts on EDV...

http://z7.invisionfree.com/Dom3mods/...0&#entry411362

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

Valerius, I think you'll find llamabeast created the Endgame Diversity Nation just so he can finally win a MP game ;)

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

No need to be nasty - I know fact that he has won at least two MP games.

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

No, Calahan's right though - anyone fancy an Endgame Diversity Test Nation vs Kailasa duel? I think it is fairly likely that I may win because of Kailasa's poor PD.

PS Much more than 2! :D

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

Also, thanks very much everyone for all the feedback. It's very helpful and I will mull over it carefully - apologies for not replying directly to the points raised.

Tomorrow I will have a lovely free day and am planning to work on the new version, so if anyone has any additional comments now would be the time to make them. Thanks!

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

Don't underestimate his Awe +4. Throws people off their game. :)

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

Generally agree with these points except I'm not sure about whether Ents should be here at all. If they are good, they make Tree Lords obsolete, if they aren't good, they are useless. I'd think more about some Were(bear?) thugs with some magic, full slots and built-in regeneration...

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

My counter to this, is why do we care about treelords anyway? They suck. They can't move, don't get you any higher magic than you had access to anyway, and don't even give you much crosspath magic. The best thing I can say about them is that there's only three of them, so if you really want a specific one, you have a good chance of getting it quickly. But seriously, the treelords are lame. The best use of them I can think of is to cast faery trod to move units around. I also don't see how were(bear) thugs would be functionally any different than treants. They would be a powerful nature summon with theoretically very similar magic paths that totally eclipsed the treelords and made them even more useless than they already are. I guess the biggest difference is that werebears would get full slots ;)


Random thought: I find the idea of a Weretree completely hilarious.

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

Yeah, treelords are just sad. Rather than worrying about the Diversity summons overshadowing them I'd much prefer boosting treelords just as we talked earlier about boosting the elemental royalty. As a starting point what about mapmove of at least 1 and #onebattlespell of Gaia's Blessing and maybe improving their magic? That way, their role isn't thug/SC duty but battlefield support.

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

By the way, Treelords can't make use of Faery Trod - they are "too immobile"! %) And yes, werebears would have free slots and some mobility.
Also agree that Treelords should be boosted similarly to elemental royalty. #onebattlespell seems to be a good way.

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

Hooray! New version released. Please see the first post for details.

Many thanks to everyone again for all the feedback. I went through it very carefully when making the update (I made notes!). Hope people enjoy the new version.

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

Thanks, llama. Would it make sense to give the .dm file a different name than the first version since several games are in progress with the .9 release?

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

Also, is this release compatible with CBM? IIRC, the last version needed a fix. Thanks Llama for your hard work on this wonderful mod.

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

Valerius - good idea. I've swapped the attachment for a new one where the .dm file has a different name.

Aethyr - I believe it is compatible with CBM, yes. I based the new version on Pyg's fixed version (where the fixes were to make it compatible with CBM). Haven't checked in detail though (but Pyg is the kind of guy who I expect probably would have checked in detail).

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

Er, another new version - this time v1.01. I had intended to increase the Roc's research level back to 6, but had forgotten before release v1.0. I think summoning mages should always take a reasonable level of research.

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

Well, I found a major bug. The one-headed zmey(monster id 2960) has #secondshape 2960 so it's practically unkillable. So does 2961 and 2962, both of them will turn to 2960 when get killed and respawn themsleves again and again.:(

btw, It seems the spell list in start of .dm file is out of date...

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

Arent these Shishi a little bit too perfect? For 30 gems, you get two very, very tough thugs with 6 attacks (effectively), at attack skill 20, 20 protection, cloud trapeze, mistform/mirror image, 3 misc slots, two immunities, 18 magic resistance, morale 30, 50 hp.

Sounds like RRrRRrRrrRAWR. All of your thugs are belong to us now.

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

zzcat: Well spotted, thanks. I've tried to fix it up, but don't have a copy of dom3 with me (away till Sunday), so I'd appreciate it if you could check I've done it correctly. The set of #firstshapes and #secondshapes for the zmey is a bit bewildering.

NooBliss: Well other people have told me they're too weak. On the other hand your poke did make me reconsider the changes I'd made in v1.01, and I think increasing the MR to 18 was an error; it's back to 16 now. Bear in mind that while they do have 3 misc slots they are missing all the other slots, and in fact are still quite killable by mortal troops.

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

I remember reading something about Shishi killing fully equipped Raksharajas, please correct me if I'm wrong. For just 15 air, I wouldnt call that 'too weak'.

They only have 3 misc slots, true. But its almost like they have all the items built-in. 3 magical attacks per round and a base atack score of 17 - roughly an equivalent of a magical two-hander. Quite comparable to wave breaker, I think. Protection 20 and two immunities - thats better than most armors and helms can give, with zero encumberance as a bonus. Always quickened means they have built-in boots of speed.
You cant customise them much, thats the problem. Still, thats a fully equipped (except misc slots) thug who can cast cloud trapeze, mirror image and mistform for just 15 air gems, summoned in pairs to save mage-time. I dont mind, really, I am looking forward to using them myself. But they shine so much, they eclipse most other summons. Dont you agree?

Oh, by the way. In SP I just killed about 60 Sauromatian Cataphracts and 30 androphag archers with one male Shishi, equipped with a pendant of luck and a girdle of might. Looks like mortal troops cant kill Shishis - they make absolutely great thugs, almost SCs in my opinion.

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

@Llamabeast: v1.02 seems OK. But it may still be a problem that #2962 has #firstshape 2962. Not tested yet but IMO it may cause unwanted curing of afflictions after battle. In addition, I think 3-headed zmey should have 6 eyes and 2-headed should have 4:)

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

You can equip a banelord with frost brand and shield of gleaming gold with same gem cost. It will have much better survivability against high damage units like barbarians and crossbowmen. And it can beat shishi 1 on 1.(shishi: 20damage*6, 20 prot, 55hp vs banelord: 35 damage, 21 prot plus shield bonus, 42hp)

Re: Endgame Diversity Mod - Lategame summons, released at last!
 

zzcat: Well spotted, thanks very much. I've had a new attempt but again would really appreciate it if you checked it as I reordered the different shapes, which definitely introduces some increased bungling possibility.