Re: Astral magic seems overpowered
 

Yeah, but CBM is pretty much the quintessential MP mod.

Re: Astral magic seems overpowered
 

damn, looks like a dictatorship to me.
all heil CBM!

Re: Astral magic seems overpowered
 

Well, CBM is enabled in around half or more of llamaserver MP's, which seem to be the majority of multiplayer games organized here. I can't say for other forums though.

But getting back to the topic - astral seeming too good. It is good. Very good. You can't go wrong with recruiting astral mages really, it offers very good spells, but mostly in the form of MR negating effects - there are a few exceptions like stellar cascades and Astral geyser which don't seem to see the use they should (well, perhaps astral geyser isn't that good afterall, it's a good opener if you call a few horrors though). SCs can easily have around 25-30 MR, I've seen 40 MR without artifact MR gear (mainly mage bane) used on a pretender. Death has it's own version of soul slay and has very good summons in conjuration (tartarians, different types of mages) and in echantment (liches, behemoths) and even their own remote raiding spell which beats pretty much any reasonable PD in the game, and one should never forget soul vortex which is one of the best tools an SC can have vs. armies.

The elemental paths have useful spells, but are a bit easy to counter or easily reduce the effectiveness of them in the form of resistance spells and thug/sc immunity gear, with maybe the exception of combination of water and fire in the form of acid spells. Still, they have their uses like it has been said in this thread.

Re: Astral magic seems overpowered
 

CBM is the standard, and in this case I'd suggest it's appropriate. Dom3 is a beautiful game, even out of the box, but I think it's just too complex for someone as close as the Devs, to the game they created, to balance it appropriately. CBM fulfills that purpose admirably (if not perfectly--there are certain points at which I disagree with certain choices. Also, CBM tends not to actually add any new content.).

I can't absolutely say that CBM is a "dictatorship" as such, but I think it's a great jumping off point, for either adding new content to, or to tweak what's already been done.

And I for one certainly wouldn't want to redo everything Quantum_Mechani has already done.

Re: Astral magic seems overpowered
 

Generally, I find Water to be the weakest path. As I found in one MP game against Rlyeh, it's a struggle to even find useful spells to cast underwater that are as good as astral's.

Re: Astral magic seems overpowered
 

Shark attack is pretty good, but other than that and frozen heart there's not too much that's very effective for water magic underwater.

Re: Astral magic seems overpowered
 

Friendly Currents and Water Ward (if that's the large scale one) can be nice. Quickening is also good.

In general you're right. Water really should be more effective underwater. Of course, that would make it even harder for land nations to attack underwater nations.

Re: Astral magic seems overpowered
 

Some of the changes in balance103

Well of misery is based on water.
Volcanic eruption (earth blood deep well) is based on fire.
Maelstron switches to air
And Mother Oak switches to earth.

thus there is one huge change: Water gives you the death gem global.

The less important is that fire gets you earth, earth gets you nature, and air gets you water.

The other important thing is that it isn't self reinforcing.. if you have nature - your won't won't be able to bootstrap into an insurmountable lead.

Re: Astral magic seems overpowered
 

Shark Attack used to be more awesome. You need a pretty big battle to make it worthwhile now. I'd prefer to cast Summon Sharks three times instead, in most cases. The little sharks distract mages in the backfield, and split up the enemy army so you're only fighting a bit of it at a time.

In a medium battle underwater (10-15 turns before an army rout), I've been lucky to get 1 or 2 sharks out of Shark Attack.

Re: Astral magic seems overpowered
 

lol, ask Calahan about Shark attack :D He cast Rigor Mortis in a battle as LA Ermor, there must've been 150+ sharks that showed up!