Re: Drain Life
 

One additional difference was that battlefield spells ( wrathful, etc ) were made very hard to cast. I'm very happy with that change. Hopefully Zen will make wrathful and it's ilk as difficult to cast in his mods.

Re: Drain Life
 

I've always wondered what would happen if every spell in the game changed so that its (total) path cost would equal the level at which it was researched.

Re: Drain Life
 

Scott,

I know you are into rubrics but I don't think that is a good one. A number of spells are powerful at the higher levels only due to their low path requirements.

It would be a fine rubric if you moved the levels of tons of spells though.

Re: Drain Life
 

That might be a part of it.

However, the suggestion would certainly 1) make the research levels actually mean something, 2) make racing up the research tree not necessarily a winning proposition, 3) make high-level magic a pick-and-choose proposition, instead of an instant-win proposition.

Re: Drain Life
 

One thing no one mentioned for defending against Ghost Riders : Juggernauts. Sure, they cost 25 astral and require a S5 caster, but 20 protection with a lot of HPs and a 17 MR makes them pretty rugged and survivable. Even better, as size 6 tramplers, they tend to mow down the ghost riders en masse - much better than abominations.

I think I've seen 4 juggernauts take 6+ simultaneous castings of ghost riders with no losses. Of course, they _are_ expensive, and you also need a mage to lead them, and while the juggernauts easily survive remote fire/cold spells, the mages tend not to.

Re: Drain Life
 

Definately worth checking out. Thanks!

Btw, my new thoughts on GR is that it should cost 10 gems. Army of Dead should be 15 gems. I have never thought that the actual spells are to powerful, or the level needed to cast it to low, but being able to cast so many via gem cost is definately an issue IMO.