Blessings balance?

[JaydedOne]

Nobody's saying the Death bless is a bad one, particularly when you contemplate mixing it with, say, the Water 9 bless.

I'm really more concerned about the Nature bless and, of course, curious to see what's become of Blood.

[BigJMoney]

Well, I'll weigh in on why I think the Nature bless, if not as powerful as fire, is still in good standing.

#1 You don't need level 9 for it to be useful.

#2 Level 9 is useful though, because an increase in Regen percentage coupled with the l9 ability is worth the points.

#3 I am crossing my fingers, hoping that having sacred/holy commanders with easy berserk potential will turn out to be very practical.

I'll counter all of that, however with this: if it's easy to get access to a spell that causes all friendly units on the battlefield to go berserk, then the bless is redundant. Actually, this is a good point by itself. When designing l9 blesses, it seems a good idea to stay away from things that can be battlefield cast (or even mass cast) anyway. Another example of why f9 is so great.

So, we'll see. If all three of my above points stand true with the game, I will be happy with the Nature bless. I'm a bit curious as to why everyone has been so silent about the Blood bless, though.

=$=

[Ballbarian]

I haven't considered the balance implications, but what about a blood bless giving a slight life drain effect to the blessed units attack. Nothing fancy, just a point or two of blood sucking damage to the defender and a point or two of hp benefit to the blessed attacker?

[Ighalli]

Afflictions in DomII worked like this:

Chance = (damage)/(remaining HP before damage)

The chance was doubled (or +100% if you prefer) for cursed units, and only happened 10% of the time if you were regenerating.

I think the B9 effect definitely needs to be changed. It causes a curse (only D4 as was mentioned) to the killer of the unit only if they fail a MR check. I think B9 should involve horror marks, either getting one from killing or perhaps injuring a blessed unit or when a blessed unit hits an enemy.

Edit: Argh! My fomulas are wrong. Thanks for the correction!

[Graeme Dice]

Ighalli said:
Chance = (damage delt)/(remaining HP before damage)

The chance was doubled (or +100% if you prefer) for cursed units, and only happened 10% of the time if you were regenerating.

The actual formulas were:

Chance = (damage dealt)/(base hitpoints)*100%

Cursed units had a (Chance + 25%) chance of getting an affliction. Regenerating units had (Chance/10).

[Wick]

Have we actually tested that it's base HPs? Way back when I was fooling with a teleporting Sphinx it was very noticeble that the afflictions started to accumulate rapidly when the HPs started to get low. Admittedly there will have been more hits by that stage but it didn't seem linear. Also, have you looked at dead guys? They all have afflictions.

These haven't been controlled tests but it's a strong perception -- what is the basis that it's otherwise?

[Graeme Dice]

Wick said:
Have we actually tested that it's base HPs?

I don't think anyone has ever tested it. I'm trying to find Johan or Kristoffer's post where they discuss it, but have had absolutely no luck so far.

Also, have you looked at dead guys? They all have afflictions.

I'm almost certain that I've seen dead units in the hall of heroes with no afflictions. I could be wrong though.