Might & Magic 6 mod: MAW; Monsters, Arts & Wonders [30/7/23 update]

The role-playing games (I-X) that started it all and the various spin-offs (including Dark Messiah).
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Re: Might & Magic 6 mod: MAW; Monsters, Arts & Wonders

Unread postby Malekitsu » 24 Feb 2023, 20:05

UPDATE:
Fixed All unique monsters in all versions of the game, making base game and specially TCC finally fully playable as intended.
Changed and fixed bow damage calculation, it will shoot faster but deal slighty less damage. (keep in mind that at master actual damage is shown damage*2)
Changed attribute breakpoints to be able to get up to +80 effect at 400 stat. (so for example 400 might will increase damage by 80)

Make sure to download the latest version.
Bow damage fix included.

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Re: Might & Magic 6 mod: MAW; Monsters, Arts & Wonders

Unread postby Malekitsu » 07 Mar 2023, 17:19

UPDATE:
3 New classes have been added, and they are designed to feel more interactive and give a more modern and dinamic gameplay.
Assassin:
Stats:
-2-3-4 HP per level (depending on promotion)
-100 SP base
-no SP per level
-can use Elemental Spells

SP will be called Energy from now on.
-Each 5 point in Speed will increase damage by 1%
-Attack will consume 30 energy to deal 50% increased damage (can crit) and will add a combo point, up to 5
-Spell cast will consume all combo points, and will deal 20% increased damage per combo point consumed; if 5 combo point are consume damage will increase by 250%.
-Melee attacks have a 30% chance to restore 15 energy.
-You will automatically restore 40 energy every 10 seconds
-SP increasing item will instead increase MAX energy by 20% of the effect.

Berserker
-3-4-6 HP per level (depending on promotion)
-100 SP base
-no SP per level
-Can use Spirit/Mind/Body

SP will be called Rage from now on
-Each 5 point in Might will increase damage by 1%
-Rage will decay at a rate of 20 every 10 seconds
-Each attack will increase rage by 15
-When at 100 or above rage your melee attacks have 50% to Make you go berserker
-When in berserker your might will be increased by 50, your damage are increased by 50%, your attacks will heal you by 10% of damage dealt
-When in berserker your attacks will consume 10 mana
-Once mana is depled, Berserker status will over with next attack
-As for assassins, SP increasing item will instead increase MAX Rage by 20% of the effect.


Blood Knight
Skills and stats are same as knight
-Each 5 point in Might will increase damage by 1%
-When above 33% of health your attacks will consume 8% of your HP
-Your damage are increased by 1% for each 1% of health missing (so being at 40% hp will mean your damage will increase by 60%)
-Attacking when below 33% will make your next 3 attack to heal you by 10% of the damage dealt

More classes and balance tuning incoming.

SETUP INSTRUCTION
Download latest version of MAW MOD
Start the game once
Go to mm6.ini and set the class you want to change to "true"
Restart game
Enjoy

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Re: Might & Magic 6 mod: MAW; Monsters, Arts & Wonders

Unread postby Tomsod » 07 Mar 2023, 18:11

Interesting! That rage mechanic is actually very similar to one of the ideas I had for an (eventual and hypothetical) MM8 mod. I'm very curious what the players will make of your Berserkers. Also, the fact that they can apparently channel their rage into prayers is amusing :P

EDIT: by "every 10 seconds" you meant 5 in-game minutes, right? That confused me for a while. Assassins could actually be strong as mages since they have functionally unlimited mana refills (but only at 8 SP per minute!) I question the 30 SP cost for the +50% damage bonus, though -- at that price, it has to compete with Incinerate, Starburst and Mass Distortion, and bows in particular are clearly inferior here (but maybe not melee attacks?) Also, the code looks like it will trigger for any Physical attack, including some spells.

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Re: Might & Magic 6 mod: MAW; Monsters, Arts & Wonders

Unread postby Malekitsu » 07 Mar 2023, 19:10

Tomsod wrote: 07 Mar 2023, 18:11 Interesting! That rage mechanic is actually very similar to one of the ideas I had for an (eventual and hypothetical) MM8 mod. I'm very curious what the players will make of your Berserkers. Also, the fact that they can apparently channel their rage into prayers is amusing :P

EDIT: by "every 10 seconds" you meant 5 in-game minutes, right? That confused me for a while. Assassins could actually be strong as mages since they have functionally unlimited mana refills (but only at 8 SP per minute!) I question the 30 SP cost for the +50% damage bonus, though -- at that price, it has to compete with Incinerate, Starburst and Mass Distortion, and bows in particular are clearly inferior here (but maybe not melee attacks?) Also, the code looks like it will trigger for any Physical attack, including some spells.
I think spells have a different function, but I will look into that!
As for Assassin:
I understand right now he can be played as a spellcaster, I was undecided if to reduce overall spell damage when there are no combo point, but I have greater plans for casters, making them preferable for a pure caster build once they are release ;)
As you said, 10 seconds=5 mins in game.
ATM bows will behave as normal attacks, consuming mana/granting rage ecc...I Might do bow balancing to behave a bit different.

Also a new separate skill enhancing class bonuses will be released ;)

There is a lot of work to do, so any design idea you want to share is welcome

EDIT:
thanks for reporting, internal version fixed arrows and physical spells, will update soon once I add few more features!

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Re: Might & Magic 6 mod: MAW; Monsters, Arts & Wonders

Unread postby Malekitsu » 10 Mar 2023, 00:43

UPDATE:

We have made several changes to the game, including the addition of the Necromancer Class, a new Mastery Skill, balance changes, and in-game tooltips!
Also a huge thanks to Eksekk, who removed Stats treshold and effect limit!
Tooltips:
Check in game Mastery Skill or check for your class description (Stats menu, right-click on top) to have all the info you might need!

Mastery Skill:
Each class now has a unique bonus that interacts with new mechanics:

The Blood Knight Mastery increases damage granted by health consumed by 10% and leech by 0.5% per skill point.
The Assassin Mastery increases the damage of energy spender by 10%, combo point ability by 5% per skill point, and adds 1% to dodge chance.
The Berserker Mastery increases Might and speed by 10 per skill point when in Berserker mode.
Class Tuning:

Assassin:
Assassin spells with no combo point will now do half the damage.
The base dodge chance for Assassins is now 5%.
The damage of energy spender ability has been decreased from 50% to 20%.

Berserker:
The rage decaying rate has been reduced from 20 to 10.
When in berserker rage, the rage spent is increased from 10 to 15.
Damage taken will now increase rage gained (1% of base health lost = 1% of rage).

Blood Knight:
The consume/leech threshold has been increased from 33% to 40%, meaning more safe gameplay.
The health consumed now depends on Base HP.
The damage calculation has changed and will now depend on consumed health (1 health consumed = 1 damage, increased by mastery).
The damage increased by missing health is reduced to 1% per 2% of missing health.

We are excited to introduce the newly released class, Necromancer, which has the following characteristics:

HP per level: 1.5, 2.25, 3 HP per level, depending on promotion.
SP per level: 4-5-7 per level, depending on promotion.
Intellect will increase spell damage done by 1% for every 5 intellect.
The Necromancer's spells will heal them by 5% of the damage done.
The Necromancer's Mana will be replenished by 5% for every kill done by the Necromancer.
The Necromancer starts with the Dark skill.
Now, let's talk about the interesting part - Mastery.
Each point in Mastery will increase the Necromancer's spell damage by 10% and spell cost by 5%.

Make sure to download latest version to enjoy latest changes.

The next class will be Seraphin, a Tank specialized on light with divine powers.

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Re: Might & Magic 6 mod: MAW; Monsters, Arts & Wonders

Unread postby Eksekk » 10 Mar 2023, 14:34

Tomsod wrote: 07 Mar 2023, 18:11 Interesting! That rage mechanic is actually very similar to one of the ideas I had for an (eventual and hypothetical) MM8 mod. I'm very curious what the players will make of your Berserkers. Also, the fact that they can apparently channel their rage into prayers is amusing :P

EDIT: by "every 10 seconds" you meant 5 in-game minutes, right? That confused me for a while. Assassins could actually be strong as mages since they have functionally unlimited mana refills (but only at 8 SP per minute!) I question the 30 SP cost for the +50% damage bonus, though -- at that price, it has to compete with Incinerate, Starburst and Mass Distortion, and bows in particular are clearly inferior here (but maybe not melee attacks?) Also, the code looks like it will trigger for any Physical attack, including some spells.
Thanks for your opinion!

Mind telling where that bit of code is located? I probably can fix it.
Unfinished mod by me: MM7 Rev4 mod, MMMerge version.

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Re: Might & Magic 6 mod: MAW; Monsters, Arts & Wonders

Unread postby Tomsod » 10 Mar 2023, 22:31

Eksekk wrote: 10 Mar 2023, 14:34 Mind telling where that bit of code is located? I probably can fix it.
It's at zASSASSIN.lua:18, but Malekitsu already fixed it.
Malekitsu wrote: There is a lot of work to do, so any design idea you want to share is welcome
I certainly can elaborate on my rage ideas. They're for MM8, though, not MM6, but maybe something inspires you?

Basically, I wanted rage to substitute for SP for magic-less classes -- that's knight and troll, and perhaps pirate if I'm adding that. It would work pretty much like in your mod -- damaging and killing enemies raises rage up to a limit, and outside combat it quickly dissipates. There would be a Berserker skill governing rage -- max rage would depend on that skill and experience level, and each mastery rank would add two abilities to the spellbook, much like racial abilities. And using the abilities costs rage points. I pretty much stole this part from MMX, where there's a very similar Warfare skill (except it uses ordinary SP). One of the normal-level abilities would enable the titular berserker rage, which like in your mod is just the Insane state, except the Berserker skill gives a damage bonus while in this state (no matter how it's induced), and dropping rage to zero automatically "cures" it, leaving the character Weak. Other abilities are a mix of special attacks ("assault" that always hits and has resistance penetration, "furious blow" that consumes all rage to deal greatly increased damage -- this can abort Insanity unless the hit itself restores some rage, -- "whirlwind" (at GM) that damages all adjacent enemies, and so on) and various aggro moves ("challenge" one monster, "taunt" all monsters in LOS) -- I probably won't copy the aggro system from the Elemental Mod, so these abilities will just make user the preferred target, like how some monsters always attack a specific class.
An open question is how to balance the berserker/Insane state so that entering it would be often useful, but not a no-brainer. Having to cast Cure Weakness after every combat is one kind of penalty, but it could also passively drain rage points, or perhaps give an armor class penalty (which would make combining it with taunt inadvisable).
I don't think my implementation would allow boosting rage pool from SP-enhancing items at all, as it's not SP, but adding a special item bonus for rage could be an option.

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Re: Might & Magic 6 mod: MAW; Monsters, Arts & Wonders

Unread postby Malekitsu » 12 Mar 2023, 14:30

Thanks for the ideas!
I will look for ways to improve rage system.
It would be cool to have the bar being red instead of blue...

that said, Seraphin class released!

Seraphin

Stats
Seraphin are blessed with divine powers, giving him +20 starting hp and +10 mana and light skill
HP per level: 3-4-5
SP per level: 2-3-4
They can use Plate, Sword, Mace and shield

Damage scaling:
Might and Personality (each 10 point in might and personality will add 1% damage)

Abilities:
Each point in light will add 2 damage to attacks; 3 at Expert and 4 at master, increased by 10% per mastery point.
Each point in body will heal the most injured party member by 2 at Novice, 2.5 Expert and 3 Master, increased by 5% per mastery point.

Divine Protection:
When a lethal attack occours on Seraphin you will consume up to 25% of your mana, converting into self healing, increased by 5% per mastery point.

Next on the list will be Shaman, a class who gain powers from magic to enchance its attacks

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Re: Might & Magic 6 mod: MAW; Monsters, Arts & Wonders

Unread postby Gray Magic Expert » 18 Mar 2023, 10:05

Thank you for this great mod!

Right now, I am playing with a party of Druid / Archer / Berserker / Seraphin. I decided to put most skillpoints into Magic Skills and to fight in melee often. Right now, I am assaulting Warlord's Fortress on level 28. Two Doomknights are already down, so my silly party seems to work quite well! That said, I am yet to fight a Cusinart Knight...

First time in ages I am using combat spells from Mind Magic. Mass Fear in particular impressed me. Despite one annoying mm6 bug, this spell proved to be very effective. I also think about learning Slow spell for my Seraphin. It is a bit expensive right now, but it will be very useful for additional crowd control...

If you need any feedpack about the mod gameply - I am ready to provide it!

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Re: Might & Magic 6 mod: MAW; Monsters, Arts & Wonders

Unread postby RawSugar » 20 Mar 2023, 14:41

Great to hear you enjoy the mod:) 28 is early for warlords fortress so hope it went well with those cuisinarts - one tip is to leave 2nd half of the dungeon for later, you can complete the quest with fighting just a few death knights.
Generally try to fight monsters near your own level, not triple ;)

Feedback is always welcome! How does mass fear seem to you? it has been balanced to be VERY strong to balance out the resources spent on it, especially vs higher level monsters, and the fact its not usable in turnmode. the reasoning is that while you are stronger using it, you wont be able to clear a dungeon faster than when not using it...did we strike that balance or should we tune it down a bit?

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Re: Might & Magic 6 mod: MAW; Monsters, Arts & Wonders

Unread postby Gray Magic Expert » 20 Mar 2023, 19:34

If fear not working in turn-based is a feature - than the Mass Fear feels exactly right, on par with other "Gamechanger" spells of its tier (Heroism, Ring of Fire, Enchant Item - things that have no replacements in other schools). The effect is extremely strong, but to utilize it fully you need to juggle many factors: your mana, the layout of the room, the enemy composition, and different combat modes. Used right - the spell can save you from a seemingly un-winnable situation. But I don't think that it is unbalanced. Not more unbalanced than meteor shower or flight, Imho.

As far a warlord fortress goes - the assault was extremely successful! A single cuisinart was a hard match, but it is pretty beatable. Separating monsters is a core skill for MAW mode, so fighting cusinarts felt like a proper challenge for my party. 3 healers and a staff master did help a lot here, not gonna lie...

I also found a few bugs:
- berserker mana drain does not work in rest mode (wait till down, wait one hour - this kind of thing)
- berserkers can learn meditation. It seems useless for them...
- fountains that give +2 speed/ +2 int and etc. do not work, except for the +2 luck well in New Sorpingal. Those fountains allowed for more extreme spreads of starting attributes, so losing them feels wrong. In the end, this is not a big deal, beacuase the shrines work every month (this is a feature from Skill Emphasis, right? Or are the shrines also bugged?)
- small descriptive bug - the new classes use wrong descriptions after a promotion. Fury uses description from Hero, Angel from Priest, and so on.
- big game-breaking bug - berserker mana drain applies even when berserker is disabled! This makes paladin un-playable. And I really want to see, how a paladin performs when compared to seraph or berserker.

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Re: Might & Magic 6 mod: MAW; Monsters, Arts & Wonders

Unread postby Malekitsu » 22 Mar 2023, 10:54

thanks a lot for the feedback!
Will look at every single issues and provide an update ASAP.

Edit:
Looks like Default MAW have those isssues mostly fixed, while TCC and Nightmare are a few commits behind.
Updating.

Edit 2:
Now all version should be updated with latest changes.
Make sure to download latest version, make a backup of current files (just in case), and replace them.
Keep in mind seraphin has a "Divine Shield" ability activated with E now.

Thanks again for the feedback, looking forward to hear more about your experience :D

Enjoy ;)

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Re: Might & Magic 6 mod: MAW; Monsters, Arts & Wonders

Unread postby Gray Magic Expert » 24 Mar 2023, 19:58

Thank you!

Least I forget, some balance related observations:
1) Berserkers not getting rise dead is bad for balance, I think. You need at least two rise dead casters to safely engage instant death monsters like Supreme Titans. With berserker not getting Rise Dead, you need yet another additional Spirit-casting class in the party. Feels kinda bad...
Thematically, berserker already keeps allies from dieing via a Guardian Angel spell, so Rise Dead is not that strange. Plus, there is semi-related "The man too angry to die". Why not have a "The man too angry to let allies die"?
2) In theory, both Spirit and Body are designed to work as strong healing schools. In practice, this fails around level 24, because Healing Touch looses to both Body healing magics and the Spirit own Master Remove Curse. Why should I be leveling spirit, if I can level body instead? By investing into Body, I get both more efficient healing and additional trick in Final Aid spell. Don't get me wrong, bless and heroism are wonderful spells, but they do not carry the Spirit school on their own. Body too has solid buffs, and also helpful damage spells (not the best, but still solid). I think that Healing Touch should cost 9 or 10 mana on master, maybe even less. This way, it will compete with mana efficiency against both Remove Curse and Body healing spells.
3) High level Light/Dark spells cost too much. I can consider spending 40 thousands for a Psychic Shock, but even it costs a bit much. I absolutely won't spend 400 thousands for a Sun Ray, or even Armageddon, for that matter.

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Re: Might & Magic 6 mod: MAW; Monsters, Arts & Wonders

Unread postby Malekitsu » 24 Mar 2023, 23:09

Gray Magic Expert wrote: 24 Mar 2023, 19:58 Thank you!

Least I forget, some balance related observations:
1) Berserkers not getting rise dead is bad for balance, I think. You need at least two rise dead casters to safely engage instant death monsters like Supreme Titans. With berserker not getting Rise Dead, you need yet another additional Spirit-casting class in the party. Feels kinda bad...
Thematically, berserker already keeps allies from dieing via a Guardian Angel spell, so Rise Dead is not that strange. Plus, there is semi-related "The man too angry to die". Why not have a "The man too angry to let allies die"?
2) In theory, both Spirit and Body are designed to work as strong healing schools. In practice, this fails around level 24, because Healing Touch looses to both Body healing magics and the Spirit own Master Remove Curse. Why should I be leveling spirit, if I can level body instead? By investing into Body, I get both more efficient healing and additional trick in Final Aid spell. Don't get me wrong, bless and heroism are wonderful spells, but they do not carry the Spirit school on their own. Body too has solid buffs, and also helpful damage spells (not the best, but still solid). I think that Healing Touch should cost 9 or 10 mana on master, maybe even less. This way, it will compete with mana efficiency against both Remove Curse and Body healing spells.
3) High level Light/Dark spells cost too much. I can consider spending 40 thousands for a Psychic Shock, but even it costs a bit much. I absolutely won't spend 400 thousands for a Sun Ray, or even Armageddon, for that matter.
Thanks again for the feedback.
1) Actually you just gave me a great idea. Berserker could get crazy bonuses whenever an ally die. His current kit actually mix in a weird way with spells and it's a completely new territory, so it may have issues we didn't yet look deeply into.
2) Spirit has resurrection spell also, which heals way much more than final Aid, and life link spell heals a lot. I agree it might lack on buffs and resurrect is not even castable by berserker due to excessive mana cost. You have a valid point and we will discuss this internally.
3) Armageddon is found in darkmoor castle, later light/dark spells are indeed expensive and it's in part on purpose, but I can agree that 400k is a bit too much, we'll look into it to maybe lower to a more reasonable amount.
Will come in the next days with updates on that.

A few questions:
How is Seraphin going so far?
Have you considered switching Archer into Rogue?

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Re: Might & Magic 6 mod: MAW; Monsters, Arts & Wonders

Unread postby Gray Magic Expert » 25 Mar 2023, 08:01

1) About Berserkers and their magic
I think that Berserker works wonderfully with spells! Managing rage for optimal outcomes is extremely fun, and rage mechanics has both upsides and downsides compared to "normal" magic. The fact that berserker does not get Plate is neat thematically, and it also adds a very good balancing twist: you can only go as far to redirect damage into your berserker, so rage-tanking does-not become super-op.
Rise Dead is not a very convenient spell to cast on berserker 'chasis' - it costs 20 mana and also needs additional healing spells to fully restore dead ally. Berserker would be much happier to cast Shared Life, or, say Harm. Those spells "just work", no additional tools required, unlike Rise Dead.

As for a class, which gets bonuses for dead allies – maybe create a new class for that purpose? Call it Avenger, and make it an alternative rage-based class.

2) About Healing Touch
Right now, Spirit Healing Spells has very few advantages compared to Body on Master Rank. Cure Wounds is strictly better than Healing Touch, and Cure Poison is strictly better than remove curse. Final Aid is cheaper in both mana and money than Resurrection. The result is simple: healer character should go for Master Body as fast as possible. Result: skill points in spirit are sub-optimal, until the goal of body 12 is reached. This leads to: Healing touch becomes pointless, because it needs considerable investment to compete with Master Remove Curse and Expert Cure Wounds.
Another problem: right now, it is hard to imagine a dedicated Self magic caster, who does not put considerable amount of skill-points into Body. This impacts mind specialists too – body master is very tasty, and body damage spells compete with mind damage spells. So, if you’re going deep into body anyways – why hurry with master mind? Just leave it at Expert 4 for a time being!
Master Healing touch at 9 mana addresses all those issues: it is enough to invest 8 into Spirit to outcompete Master Remove Curse, but only at 12 spirit Healing Touch becomes comparable with Master Cure Poison. Thus, a Master spirit 10 can still be a very good healer, but not as good as Master body 12. So, if I want a strong healer without too steep of skillpoint cost – I go 10 Spirit Master. If I want a true dedicated healer – I can choose between Body 12 and Spirit 12, depending on secondary factors, like what other spells I want to optimize.

3) About Seraphs:
As far as comparison Seraph/Cleric goes, both classes have their advantages. Seraph is tankier, but cleric has more mana and also gets an option of learning Dark, which is the best non-elemental damage school.
As far as comparison Seraph/Berserker goes, they are both melee-heavy Self-Magic casters. However, each has their own niche. Seraph is mana based, while berserker is Rage based. Berserker is better for spamming same spell over and over, while seraph is better for having mana for a crucial spell in reserve.
What needs testing, is Seraph/Paladin. On one hand, Paladins gets more mana regen from their second promo bonus, and also have superior weapon skills. On other hand, is it enough to compete with seraph’s Light Magic bonus to Damage and free healing in melee? I don’t know for now. This needs additional testing.

4) Archer and Rogue.
Archer is perfect for my current party. More tankinies for melee combat, and a big mana pool to go all out in a crucial situation. Mana regen is impressive too, thanks to second promo bonus. That said, I am considering launching a Rogue-Rogue-Paladin-Seraph party for nightmare, to test both rogue class and Paladin/Seraph balance.

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Re: Might & Magic 6 mod: MAW; Monsters, Arts & Wonders

Unread postby RawSugar » 25 Mar 2023, 08:16

berserkers damage output is too strong to also have useful spells. it might be better to give him a different school though rather than remove the useful ones. Or none at all, rather.

spirit; you just need 12 ranks for healing touch to be better than remove curse, at end of the game you will have 30+ ranks in a favored school. Healing touch is more mana efficient than cure wounds. shared life is less efficient than power cure but comes with the amazing effect of evening out life. I'd say its pretty balanced, although it IS by design that body is slightly better if all you want is healing.
the choice is;
Pure healer; you will likely favor Body, although you lose out on efficient shared life, spirit arrow and guardian
Melee party; you will likely favor Spirit since the healing is 95% as efficient and the buffs are meaningful
Mind is the damage dealer and offhealer school. it has no adcantage as pure healing but psychic shock and mind blast are very strong damage spells

light/dark costs have been the subject of some debate, we will revisit :)

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Re: Might & Magic 6 mod: MAW; Monsters, Arts & Wonders

Unread postby Gray Magic Expert » 25 Mar 2023, 10:23

Re: Berserkers and spells
I'll check, how OP is berserker damage feels later in the run. So far, being melee only is a good balancing factor. It works as follows:
Pros:
- You can kick Cusinarts really hard!
Cons:
- Cusinarts can kick YOU really hard!
To really take advantage of berserker damage, you need to invest into weapon skills and mastery, and maintain Insanity status. Both those things have antisynergy with going into magic. Moreover, when casting spells, berserker does not hit the enemies with big melee damage! If the berserker gets forced to cast healing spells only - your whole party is on backfoot! And if berserker throws a big Psychic Shock - how is it more op that a strong melee punch?

Right now, berserker feels pretty balanced versus the archer. Both classes can go into both magic and weapons. But investing into weapons takes away from investing into magic! Dedicated caster berserker has an option of going into rage, but he/she also needs to go into melee to gain mana for spells and going into rage status can leave him/her out of mana for the spells required! By contrast, archer has a less outstanding melee option, but the class is always strong at ranged combat, by virtue of either bow, or elemental spells! So far, everything feels very balanced. Berserkes do scary things, but they also have high opportunity costs. Their magic is fine.

Re: Self Magic
1) About Spirit balance (why healing touch for 9 mana would be good for the game)
I have a pure melee party, yet I feel quite dissapointed after choosing Heavy spirit instead of Heavy body for my Berserker. Even with Body specialist Seraph and tretiary healer Druid, going all-in into spirit feels inferior. This was not a problem, when every skill was on expert, but at at levels around 30 spirit healing lacks behind very noticeably, and spirit buffs do not require much additional investment. And physical damage spells from body, as sub-optimal as they are, would be very helpful with 12 master Body skill at hand.

So no, spirit right now feels lacking compared to body, even for my melee-heavy party, with many healing characters. And 9 mana healing touch would address this issue quite nicely. Late game Heavy spirit will be more mana-efficient, but late game Heavy body would still heal more HP per cast by virtue of Power Cure and Final Aid, but also with a cure wounds spell.

2) How Spirit and Body balance impacts Mind builds. (Edit: clarified build details a little)
Having 12 body master should give you 126 average physical damage on Flying Fist (if 30+1d15 per skill formula works correctly. It may not. At the very least, spell description is broken in game). Psychic shock is stronger indeed, but it hits a far greater resitance. You need 5 mind to match raw damage numbers and about 9 points, if we assume that mind spells do 50% more damage to compensate for Magic resistance. Investing additional 5 points after expert Mind 4 may be okay. But investing 5+6+7+8+9=35 points delays master body by quite a lot.

Master body 12 is much stronger than Expert body 9, which is still stronger than Spirit master 9. Therefore, it is much better to go master body 12 than, say Master spirit 8/ Expert mind 7, or Expert body 8/ Expert mind 7 which both have inferior healing and likely inferior damage compared to master body 12. Therefore, investing into mind early cannot be a good primary goal for Self-magic casters. Keep in mind, that Druids can also learn, say, Earth or Fire, Clerics can also learn Dark, Berserkers are melee powerhouses and Seraphs gain additional synergy from Body skillpoints.

As it stands now, there is no class, which truly benefits from going all-in on mind before getting body 12. Buffs to spirit would help addressing this issue too. Spirit master 8 being a stronger healer allows an alternative to Body master 12. Of course spirit master 8 would be still inferior to master body 12, but it would still be quite adequate. Investing only 8 skillpoints into spirit instead of 12 into would in turn allow for earlier investment into mind.

Besides, an idea of dedicated Mind/Spirit caster build sounds very cool thematically. Right now this build looses quite hard to Body/Mind casters.

RawSugar
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Re: Might & Magic 6 mod: MAW; Monsters, Arts & Wonders

Unread postby RawSugar » 25 Mar 2023, 14:30

Its an interesting take to use berserker as caster. i think you will find later levels its not a viable strat but interesting for sure. There is absolutely nothing wrong with berserker using rank dependent magic. There is an issue with him having access to a spell like raise dead that is already ultra useful at 4 ranks. He's already arguably superior to knights as a melee character, giving him raise dead as well is too much.
He's certainly not designed to be a caster:) i guess its worth taking into account that this is even an option :P
Actually after the mana for taking damage was added you're right he might well be a strong caster. thats not really intended i'd say^^

at rank 12 you have
cure wounds healing 97 for 16 mana vs healing touch healing 75 for 12 mana, healing touch is slightly more mana efficient, cure wounds heal a bit more
power cure heals somewhat more than shared life but not much more and shared life has an incredibly useful extra effect

Body IS somewhat better at healing but spirit also adds significant extra damage to your melee team and gives you a strong free attack, as well as guardian.

If you go mind you wont usually go body at all, you will either have another healer or none at all, you dont need to become healer just because you have access to it, clerics, palas and druids can be excellent damage dealers using mind spells, mind is not inferior to any other school as a damage school, and when ranking that will not usually also rank healing magic.

so like agreed if you have body spirit and mind at same rank body will almost always be the better school for healing but you wont usually have those schools ranked together, and mind and spirit offers other boons than healing that balances out the healing you get for ranking body.
Last edited by RawSugar on 25 Mar 2023, 15:28, edited 1 time in total.

Gray Magic Expert
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Re: Might & Magic 6 mod: MAW; Monsters, Arts & Wonders

Unread postby Gray Magic Expert » 25 Mar 2023, 15:26

Knight vs Berserker: Knight has 3 strong points compared to berserker
1) Champion can compete with 2nd promo archer as a ranged character. (Same bonus to bow damage) Berserker cannot.
2) Knight has plate armor, and can intercept attacks for allies. Berserker cannot.
3) Knight has better HP per level.
*) Knight, unlike berserker, also gets dagger. In grand scheme of things, this is not very important. But in short term, it guarantees an access to Vampiric Weapon in Mordred. It heals larger percentage then raging berserker too.

So knight has a number of clear advantages. I won't mind trading my berserker for a knight. I just find berserker a more interesting class to playtest.

And as far as utility goes, Rise Dead is not that big of utility spell in most of the cases. It is crucial against Supreme Titans, if you want to fight them fairly (as opposed to bombing them by stars/meteors/death blossoms from cover), but has few other truly meaningful uses. So I don't understand, how it would make berserker imbalanced. It is as niche as Morded healing for knight. I don't think that it breaks anything.

As far as Body/Spirit goes:
- 8 mana Master cure poison is much more mana-efficient than 12 mana remove curse.
- 100 mana final aid is better than 200 mana ressurection, unless you get into a truly dire situation.
- 12 mana healing touch is only slightly better than 8 mana cure poison, while healing less than 16 mana cure wounds. Again, body is better.
- Power cure heals more than Shared Life, and shared life utility works just fine with 4 skillpoints as it does with 12 skillpoints. And situation when you need to both add hp and redistribute them with a single cast is extremely rare.

Cheaper (9 mana) healing touch won't make Body magic useless. And even if it does prove to be slightly op - you can always rise its cost to 10 mana. Still much better than current 12.

Believe me, I have a 10 spirit Master berserker and 10 body Expert seraph. Those 10 points in Spirit do not translate into better healing, despite both seraph and berserker sharing duty as healers in the situations of dire need.

RawSugar
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Re: Might & Magic 6 mod: MAW; Monsters, Arts & Wonders

Unread postby RawSugar » 25 Mar 2023, 15:50

knight has some nice advantages but berserker outdamages him by a fair bit. and i think you will find that death can find you in MAW in a lot more situations than vs titans ;)

in almost every situation a high rank shared life is better than final aid/ress.
cure poison is briefly viable at rank 12, after a few more ranks healing touch etc is far better
casting shared life at rank 4 can be neccessary but uses precious time. casting it at rank 30 boosts your life total significantly

You defo could respec to body w your berserker and he would heal a little more. but you would lose out on + hit and damage to every team member, you would lose out on spirit arrow. I dont think your party would be stronger if you went body instead.


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