Annoying death magic
 

Lots of death magic is really cool, but for the love of all that is unholy why must my mages spam what they spam?!?

I absolutely dread researching the raise blank skills (enchantment?). Sometimes I like them and I want to go for that, but other times I want to be able to use something else. I feel like it is a waste to research anything else once I have researched the raise spells as that is all the spell AI seems to want to cast.

How bout a shadow bolt or some terror Mr.AI? No? Okay keep spamming raise dead even though I have 400 skeletons already that are stuck against a wall and being destroyed by arrows and priests...sigh.

And decay. I HATE decay. Once I have that and a raise spell, forget it, thats ALL they will do. What makes it worse is I never see decay do anything other than make my mages useless. I keep checking the numbers on the guy they are spamming, but his protection and defense stay the same.

I know I can give specific spell commands, but it seems a bit iffy. Sometimes they do what I tell them, sometimes not. Even if they do, I will only get 5 spells I want, then they are back to raise/ decay mode. I wish I could tell them which spells NOT to use. I would like to erase decay from every spellbook save one mage per battle. Or be able to tell them not to raise as I already have enough troops and rather need more direct offensive casting.

Am I doing something wrong or is this just the way of things?

Re: Annoying death magic
 

I think we all agree that a commander-per-commander DON'T CAST/DO X would be nice. That seems like a temperate enough suggestion that I also would agree.

Re: Annoying death magic
 

This issue has had numerous debates over the past 2+ months ...

As a piece of friendly advice (to both of you), might I suggest that you do topic searches before creating new threads? It helps to avoid umpteen different threads asking the same questions and getting the same answers. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

Re: Annoying death magic
 

Oh, sorry http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif I do tend to start a lot of threads/answer ones with few answers.

Re: Annoying death magic
 

I actually think it's useful to find folks start new topics on issues like this with their own words.

Because it lets the devs know that this is something for which there is a perceived need for change. And orders "don't do x" don't seem that difficult to implement to me from a programming perspective.

Re: Annoying death magic
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">They can still use their own words in existing threads. And using existing threads avoids much confusion.

Re: Annoying death magic
 

The issue of Do / Don't Cast lists comes down to game balance. Mages, backed by just moderate research levels, would be immensely more powerful. The recruitment costs of mages would need to be raised proportionally to their new powers.

Aikamun

Re: Annoying death magic
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I strongly disagree with both it being a balance issue and with mages needing to cost more if it's changed.

It's a design flaw/oversight, technically. The devs only have so much time to create stuff, and to fix bugs. When they built the system, they (being a very small team of 2) didn't have the resources (time, etc.) to plan for every contingency and code accordingly. They implemented AI-driven combat spellcasting code that is one notch above basic. The only "frill" is a 5-order queue. Extra niceties like exclude lists, or a UI with enabling checkboxes they simply didn't have time for (assuming they had the idea in the first place). Therefore odd things happen during combat. No one in their right mind would intentionally design code that would spam useless spells. And to say that mages should cost more after this is fixed implies the system works as intended. Hardly. The devs have already stated that spell-spamming is not intended behavior for the combat AI. The current costs of mages assumes the combat AI casts spells rationally, which isn't the present situation.

Re: Annoying death magic
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">How far from any enemies are your mages. Terror is range 25, shadow bolt is 30. They won't necessarily even be able to hit any enemies if your mages are at the very back, so they will cast other spells.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Have you made any attempt to figure out what decay does? If it hits the target, and they fail a magic resistance check, then they will die unless they are regenerating. You mages will also cast decay if their fatigue and death skill is high to prevent them from going unconscious.

I think many complaints about spellcasting come from people that haven't put enough effort into figuring out why their mages cast the spells they cast.

Re: Annoying death magic
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">This is likely true. However ...

A mage spamming Body Ethereal 6 times in a row, while within range of other spells, *is* a bug. As is a mage casting Air Shield when it is already protected with Air Blessing 10, or when there are no enemies on the field that are capable of launching missiles.

The problem is legitimate, regardless of the competency of some new (or even old) players.

EDIT: oh, and if a mage is too far for any useful spells, then the AI should simply DO NOTHING (and avoid spell fatigue) rather than cast useless spells.

[ March 02, 2004, 01:56: Message edited by: Arryn ]

Re: Annoying death magic
 

Ok. Thanks for pointing that out, Arryn. I was not aware Illwinter had stated they were dissatisfied by the spell AI.

Aikamun

Re: Annoying death magic
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I have never seen a mage cast Body Ethereal on the same square more than once. Yes they will cast it six times in a row, but that's because it has a range of 1 and an area of effect of 1. 6 casts will protect most units that surround the mage. That's hardly a bug when the spell as a useful effect. It might not be what you consider to be the most useful effect, but I'm quite happy to have starspawn mages etherealize all the Illithid's surrounding them without me having to tell them to.

There are a few bugs with spell targeting, but most of them are not that serious.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">You'd have to define exactly what a "useful" spell is in numerical terms then. Raise skeletons/dead is certainly never useless, it's one of the most powerful summoning spells with no gem cost in the game. Decay is certainly not useless if it hits a unit, and it's fairly precise for such a low level spell. A mage should never do nothing with their turn, as they will never regain fatigue unless unconscious, and doing nothing would lead to even more complaints from people who do not understand what is going on.

Re: Annoying death magic
 

There's another, related, problem with "Cast spells" orders. If the AI would refrain from casting spells at all if no *useful* spells were within range (useful being defined as harming the enemy or helping friendlies that have not already been helped by an earlier casting of the spell under consideration), then that's one solution. Another solution, which the devs have deliberately not coded is to have mages get closer to the enemy so they are in range of something. IW said they didn't do this to avoid complaints of mages "rushing into battle" where they might become exposed to melee. Alas, that takes the choice out of player's hands.

They could create two variations:

1. Cast Spells in place.
2. Close and cast spells.

The first order makes sure the mage never moves. The second order permits some freedom of motion to move forward to cast, as needed.

Another useful option would be "Cast spells and retreat", which would have mages flee if an enemy got near them.

Re: Annoying death magic
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I have. Only mage on my side, and no troops within even range 25. The mage *could* have cast Incinerate ...

EDIT: the mage could also cast Paralyze and Soul Slay, but didn't.

[ March 02, 2004, 02:20: Message edited by: Arryn ]

Re: Annoying death magic
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">The AI already does this. Put some level two priests on the battlefield with blessing, blessing, cast spells, and no other undead or sacred units. You'll find that they cast blessing on themselves once, then tend to switch to stay behind troops, since they have no other useful spells. All the other paths of magic have at least a spell such as flying shards, so those mages will use it.

I have never seen the AI cast a spell on friendlies that already had the spell cast on them, other than the previously mentioned air shield on a level 10 air blessing.

Re: Annoying death magic
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Then you have been living in a Dom 2 paradise, which I envy, for I'm not the only person to see the AI repeat castings on the caster, or upon others.

Re: Annoying death magic
 

If the AI was setup so that a mage would not cast anything if it wasn't in range, my strategy would be ruined. I depend on that.

I've noticed if you script a mage to cast the same spell over aand over, it will usually continue to do that (with the exception of smarter spells here and there). The AI isn't as bad as you think...

..But I am always with the people who want AI improvement.

Re: Annoying death magic
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">If there were no troops within range 25, then it couldn't cast incinerate. That's its range.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Which patch were you using when you saw this behaviour?

Re: Annoying death magic
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">If your "strategy" is to count on the AI fatiguing itself, or other such stupid behaviors, you're only cheating yourself by using what is basically an exploit. Against a human you'll be waxed and polished.

Re: Annoying death magic
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">If there were no troops within range 25, then it couldn't cast incinerate. That's its range.</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">None of *my* troops. It was a SC pretender, solo. There were plenty of enemies in range.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Which patch were you using when you saw this behaviour?</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">2.06

Re: Annoying death magic
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">No, his strategy is to rely on his own mages casting spells as often as possible, such as the very useful raise skeletons/drain life/ raise skeletons/drain life combo that the AI is very good at doing.

Re: Annoying death magic
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">As you've pointed out though, this wa in 2.06, so it doesn't really apply.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">2.06 </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Have you seen the same behaviour after the verson 2.08 changes to the spell selection heuristic? You really can't use the old examples when the AI _is_ being changed with every patch.

Re: Annoying death magic
 

Graeme, other people have reported that it's not been fully fixed in 2.08, despite the devs trying to.

Re: Annoying death magic
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">That's just it. Where are these reports of such behaviour? I haven't seen any reports that weren't explainable through the already known game mechanics, and I read virtually every post that comes through here.

Like I said, the only one I've seen in 2.08 of double protection is air sheild/air blessing.

Re: Annoying death magic
 

As for the original topic, I've been seeing the AI making use of Nether Bolts and Ghost Grope (sic), and non-death spells from death mages.

PvK

Re: Annoying death magic
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">This was common in castle defense, even in 2.06

Re: Annoying death magic
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">This was common in castle defense, even in 2.06 </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Well, it was common in Doms I http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif Nether Darts is the most overpowered evocation, ergo, it gets cast.

Hard to say about spell AI. In 2.08, I have not seen Druids berserking other nearby mages anymore. But I did see an enemy pretender kill himself with Shock Wave. Ouch! I sent a turbo-assassin (assassin w/Lifelong Protection) against him, with orders to hold, and the hyper-powered AI commander (Freak Lord with Air 7, Earth 6, Nature 9, and 1 in all other paths, I think) cast Flame Shield, Astral Shield, a few Blade Winds (on nearby imps), and finally Shock Wave, twice. It was, in fact, brilliant - the choices were very good. Well, except that imps are immune to fire, but oh well=) The Shock Waves cleared away my imps quite well... but alas, the second one killed the pretender too. I've never seen a unit damage itself with Shock Wave before... In this case, there was not much choice, because it was surrounded by imps, so it might have seemed like a good idea (no time to cast resistance, I better push the button now!).

2.08 has some nice battle formation and strategic improvements. As Marignon, I got a random Friar / Flagellant uprising against Spectral Ermor. Meaning, 4 friars - quite a few! When they counter-attacked, they used... ONLY STANDARD TROOPS! No undeads at all. Well, possibly they lost all their undead leaders. But it turned out brilliantly:

2 Heavy Cavalry on the far-forward, top-and-bottom flanks, set to "Attack Rear". These guys went straight to the back and killed my 4 friars, skipping all my province defense and flagellants.

2 Groups of maybe 8 Tribal Archers in the middle, which rained arrows on my flags and killed them without a fight. By the time my province defense pikeneers arrived, the HC had killed all my leaders and they routed.

Wow! My army was worthless! There was nothing for my Friars to banish, and my normal troops didn't even get a chance to fight.

Re: Annoying death magic
 

Originally posted by Arryn:

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Arryn, would you tell me what confusion this thread has created? I see no confusion here...merely intelligent discussion of what some see as an issue. And discussion from a somewhat different perspective that would likely have occurred if an old thread were for some reason resurrected.

I agree with graeme dice on the "body ethereal" issue. Especially if you have your core commanders and other potentially non-astral magi back with your astral mage, such as a shaman. It's wonderful that your shaman is etherealizing your other magi and commanders to prevent them from being slain by stray crossbow bolts. In fact, I will often script shamen with this.

I actually wouldn't mind mages moving up a bit to target the scripted spells if they're not moving into enemy melee troops and have some sort of missile protection. Most of my problems with what I consider inappropriate spells occur when the mages are at the back (where I put them--my fault) and the enemy's troops are at the back of their line firing missiles.

It would also be nice to know what range 100 means...can it affect the entire battlefield? Because I often script stellar cascades with Ry'leh (?sp) and find that the spell AI disagrees with my choice and casts something else even though there is a group of massed defenders nearby. (I'm not thinking mind burn is a better decision for a group of astral 4 and astral 3 magi (base) in the setting where a commander is holding a banner of the northern star.)

I agree that it would be a bad idea to have the magi rush into melee. But what do you need to check for to prevent that? Just check...on turn 3 or subsequently due to hold and attack orders...to see whether there is a group of melee units rushing forward. I have no idea how hard that would be to code.

I have not used 2.08 yet (using 2.06) due to the fact that it creates bugs (utgard) and supposedly increases the disparity between battle reports and battle replays in SP. (I find that particular bug more annoying that I reasonably should because I still watch most of the battle replays.)

I have seen the AI use ghost grip, too. And seeing that is very pleasant because it's such an awesome spell.

Re: Annoying death magic
 

Range 100 can reach anywhere on battlefield. But do not confuse range (distance) with area of effect.

Spells that affect the entire battlefield say so, under Area of Effect.

[ March 02, 2004, 14:40: Message edited by: Arryn ]

Re: Annoying death magic
 

To the original poster:

You will likely do not know this as a new player, but back in Dom I the battle summons were considered to be overpowered (it was pretty simple to destroy big armies with just a force of summoners, while suffering _no_ loses), thus most of those battle summons were downed to require gems, with 2 exceptions: phantasmal critters, and raise the dead/skeletons spells.

Rejoice that you can still use battle summons as a Death magic user!

If you really do not want to get those you should deploy your mages forward in the battlefield, so that they are in range for their evocations (*) or not deploy them at all and keep them at your labs. Obviously, you should also get some research in alternate battle magics (Evocation, Thaumaturgy, Alteration...) so that you know other spells.

Do not dismiss Decay as a useless spell. The AI switches to it when faced with a high HP critter, and it's a spell that can potentially kill a Pretender. Back in a DomI MP game, a single dusk elder of mine killed 3(!) Iron Dragons on his own using this spell. That's 75 gems worth of Const9 critters killed with a thau1 spell. This spell shines vs big boys with low MR (like Crushers, Spiders, Krakens...)

I generally concur with Graeme regarding the ret of the thread, 90% of the complaints about the spell AI from new players are due to bad battlefield placement or lack of research. There are indeed previous threads about this.

(*) range of spells/missiles is meassured in squares (you can turn on the grid with a key command to see it), the battlefield is around 54 squares long IIRC, so a mage in the back will barely be able to hit the middle with a 30some range spell.

Re: Annoying death magic
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">What key command is this? This is the first I've heard of one ...

Re: Annoying death magic
 

"w"

Re: Annoying death magic
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Thanks, Cherry! This is *SO* cool. I wish I'd known this weeks ago! It'll make my AAR write-ups a bit faster to do.

Too bad the grid makes the terrain disappear. I was expecting bright red/yellow/blue lines or some such overlaying the ground, instead of the an entirely different battle map.

Re: Annoying death magic
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">This feature is definitely needed... hopefully available in one of the upcoming patches.

Re: Annoying death magic
 

Arryn, if you want to keep the background use "G" instead of "W".

Quote:

Originally posted by Kryx: [qb] I think we all agree that a commander-per-commander DON'T CAST/DO X would be nice.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Well, I do not agree.

For one, this would exponentially increase the micromanagement from scripting mages.

For two, such absolute control would require a re-balancing of many spells.

Re: Annoying death magic
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Thanks! That's much better. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif

Re: Annoying death magic
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">No, his strategy is to rely on his own mages casting spells as often as possible, such as the very useful raise skeletons/drain life/ raise skeletons/drain life combo that the AI is very good at doing. </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Thank you, Graeme. I got so damn pissed when I read this comment by Arryn. I was going to explode in flammage until I read your comment.

Re: Annoying death magic
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">POOF!

Isn't this what happens to your undead when they are confronted by semi-competent priests and mages? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/tongue.gif

[ March 02, 2004, 20:07: Message edited by: Arryn ]

Re: Annoying death magic
 

Orders to not do certain things might indeed require immense micromanagement of magi.

But I don't mind that. Especially since hopefully ctrl-# would copy everything about the mage including "don't do X" orders.

Of course, I'd settle for a global or nationwide "don't do X" order that would apply to all of your combats. Because magi do some things that are really annoying like casting breath of the dragon on ulm black plate infantry that can hardly be affected by opposing infantry. Like turning adjacent mages berserk (though I hear some of that was fixed in 2.08). And sometimes you don't want your mages summoning masses of undead.

I don't want my astral 5 or astral 6 starspawns (starshine skullcap and banner of the north star) casting mind burn against massed crossbows when stellar cascades is so cheap.

Re: Annoying death magic
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">POOF!

Isn't this what happens to your undead when they are confronted by semi-competent priests and mages? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/tongue.gif </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">no http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/tongue.gif

Re: Annoying death magic
 

If they are occupying the opponent's mages and priests, they are doing their job as mana / action points / fatigue fodder. Nice to distract some attention from better banishable summons.

Using fatigue is a valid tactic. If spells can increase encumbrance and melee fatigue lowers defense and protection, how is it an exploit? Sounds like a very smart weapon in one's arsenal, especially for the Brandenburg Guard.

Aikamun

[ March 03, 2004, 07:55: Message edited by: Aikamun ]

Re: Annoying death magic
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I have seen the "host" phase Messages that seem to talk about the cntrl # and shift something stuff. However the turn generation goes by to fast to read it. Could someone please explain this feature as the manual does not cover it?

I have been wanting to ask about it but the anti new post backlash is pretty strong here and my search button does not seem as magical as others'. So, since you mentioned it...

Re: Annoying death magic
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">This is the thread that search turns up. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

EDIT: what is meant by "#" in the above thread is one of the number keys on the top row of the keyboard. That is, CTRL-1, CTRL-2, etc.

[ March 03, 2004, 23:16: Message edited by: Arryn ]