Conceptual Balance Series (Mod)

[Edi]

The Enslave Mind attack has 5 shots, and the hama dryad is almost worse than useless without it for the reasons QM listed. The proper solution is to bring enough chaff to render them irrelevant.

It's not an insurmountable problem.

Edi

[Zen]

Mr. Patrick! I haven't heard much feedback about the Spellmod, however, I have heard that people thought this was perhaps too powerful. Though QM and Edi are quick to point out they don't seem so, I tend to agree. I would have rather not had them "Enslave Mind" but perhaps Charm, or confuse or something similiar but the effect is really what I'm looking for.

For the Hama to be strong enough in it's singular role that it is extremely useful for what it can do. This comes from the fact that the unit will die within 2 turns of being outside their home province. They *might* be a little too cost efficent, but I haven't yet run into a situation with too many hama dryads that I haven't been able to deal with them before.

Something of note: When you make the Hama's have a 0/2 movement you actually see the AI use them, apparently when they have movement the AI will move them around and unknowingly kill them.

[Edi]

As a note, I think the charm spell also has the Enslave Mind attack effect, just that the spell sound effect is different because it is specified in a different place maybe? The Enslave Mind attack (that units may have) uses the astral spell default sound, and the nature spell charm uses the nature spell default sound, but it still has the same attack effect (it must, because all damaging spells with special effects must have something for the effect) because there are no others. Unless the spells have a Category of those all on their own, but I doubt it.

Edi

[Zen]

It's at least slightly different. Since when you Charm a commander they keep their Commander status while if you Enslave Mind a Commander they are regulated to a Unit regardless of their previous status.

Hellbind Heart falls into this same Category.

It doesn't in actuality matter very much, I would love to be able to change the Enslave's Penetration bonus/penalty but that is doable with the current Mod tools. Same with Mind BLast.

So Edi, any feedback from you, O' Editor?

[Edi]

Haven't had time to actually try the spell mod out, I'm just assessing the differences based on what I know of the abilities, costs and effects that the modifications affect and drawing educated guesses.

I've been much too busy producing other documentation, like the completely revised, rechecked, expanded and more accurate magic site list that will be made available for public consumption tomorrow (as will an updated unit DB, though the modifications to that are pretty minor in comparison). And doing non-Dom2 related things. But I'm actually starting a couple of SP games to try out the spell mod. I should also update the Faerun map files (assign VPs to some places, correct at least one border error that slipped through and recheck a couple of other things), but that will take a couple of days.

Edi

[deccan]

Does Enslave Mind have a better inherent MR penetration than Charm? How about Hellbind Heart?

[Gandalf Parker]

Zen said:
It's at least slightly different. Since when you Charm a commander they keep their Commander status while if you Enslave Mind a Commander they are regulated to a Unit regardless of their previous status.

Hellbind Heart falls into this same Category.

It doesn't in actuality matter very much, I would love to be able to change the Enslave's Penetration bonus/penalty but that is doable with the current Mod tools. Same with Mind BLast.

So Edi, any feedback from you, O' Editor?

Im not sure if I read that right. Unless something changed then hellbind has no effect other than them switching sides. Ive gotten my best commanders, mages, equipment, and even multiple prophets with hellbind.

I also love the "double damage" thing. Not only have I gained powerful commanders with experience and equipment, but he has lost the same. His advancing army now has many units with no leader which cannot advance and will rout if even a scout attacks.

[Zen]

This means:

Charm = Hellbind Heart (You get commanders as commanders)

Enslave Mind, Master Enslave, turn commanders into units when they switch sides.

For Penetration: It's the same across the board except for the Enslave Mind Weapon, which has less penetration (I believe). Though of course the added penetration of exceeded Paths is different (Hellbind having the most potential Penetration with the same number of paths).

[st.patrik]

What about making the enslave mind have a very high fatigue cost, or something like that?

Just to explain why I thought it was overpowered - I played a game vs. AI as Arco, and was attacked on several occasions by small Groups involving 5 Hama Dryads. I had a much larger force, but ended all such engagements losing most of my guys without killing a single one of the enemy. I agree that it would be hard to use this strategically, with the need to build labs etc., so what I am more concerned with is the defensive effect of having, say 10, dryads guarding each of your fortresses. stick in a couple of heavies to jam the doorway and your fortress is never going to fall - especially if you throw in a staff of storms to make sure flyers can't get in.
Also a handful of hama dryads would be worth sacrificing when used offensively, if they are basically able to take out your enemy's army (and probably win you some new troops (worth more than the summoning cost of the dryads themselves) in the process.

What about instead of giving them a ranged attack you just made them a lot tougher in combat - higher defense score, perhaps a life-drain melee attack, or something like that?

Other than this detail I like a lot of what you've done Zen. Have the devs tried this stuff out, does anyone know?

[Cainehill]

IMO, higher defense score, life drain melee, etc, wouldn't make anyone go for hamadryads. And, I don't think any form of life drain would be particularly thematic, whereas a charm attack _is_ very thematic for dryads.