[Scott Hebert]

It was. All that's needed to add a pretender choice to a nation should be:

#selectmonster -monsternumber-
#restrictedgod -nationnumber-
#end

In general it does work. However when I tried to give the VQ back to Ermor, it didn't work for Ermor. I haven't tried with the warlock, but if someone knows the monster number for him, I'd be glad to try it.

According to the ID file, he's 486. Skratti appears to be 500.

Otherwise, they could still be added, but would need to be reconstructred, which works for many not-too-complex types, but getting the graphics is a bit of a chore (I have several mods more or less ready but stalled because it takes me hours to get the sprites right).

The graphics is a problem.

I like the general ability & path-adding/boosting approach of Zen's mod (1W1D would be useful for Frost father since cold and undead go together, though I agree 2W or 1W1A might be more appropriate).

I think the reason he's WD is because he's an Ice Druid, and Ice Druids get WD. I see it as perfectly appropriate that he's WD.

I also like the idea of a code tweak that would mean humans could be better at raising paths they don't start with, without needing to give them all a starting level. Seems like a long shot for IW to agree and code it, though.

It doesn't too hard to code, to be honest. I'm not a programmer, though.

Another option is to vary path costs by the nation you choose. Abysia gets cheap Fire and Blood, but very bad Water, etc.

Another possible approach would be to increase new path costs for non-humans even farther, but that would reduce the options for non-humans, which might not be good.

I personally think that this doesn't really solve the problem, because of the math I originally posted. Now, if the path cost was _cumulative_ (meaning: first new path was pathcost, second new path was 2xpathcost), it would enhance the 'specialist' vs. 'generalist' role that the path cost already serves.

Note: I don't think that the old path costs may be appropriate under this new system.