.com.unity Forums
  The Official e-Store of Shrapnel Games

This Month's Specials

Bronze- Save $9.00
winSPMBT: Main Battle Tank- Save $5.00

   







Go Back   .com.unity Forums > Illwinter Game Design > Dominions 3: The Awakening

Reply
 
Thread Tools Display Modes
  #21  
Old April 28th, 2008, 06:53 AM
Dedas's Avatar

Dedas Dedas is offline
Lieutenant Colonel
 
Join Date: Nov 2005
Location: Lund, Sweden
Posts: 1,377
Thanks: 72
Thanked 25 Times in 20 Posts
Dedas is on a distinguished road
Default Re: Strands of Astral Power. Worth it?

Yes, exactly, it works very well. You just have to use it right. If you are going to take out astral mages with it you better have the right equipment on the casting mage. Not doing it in a drain dominion also helps of course.
Reply With Quote
  #22  
Old April 28th, 2008, 09:37 AM

Sombre Sombre is offline
BANNED USER
 
Join Date: Feb 2007
Posts: 5,463
Thanks: 165
Thanked 324 Times in 190 Posts
Sombre is on a distinguished road
Default Re: Strands of Astral Power. Worth it?

Tuidjy seems to think the penetration items don't help.

I misread about his magic scale above. Magic scale would clearly help, but SoAP still sounds pretty ****ty. Maybe it should say in the description that it requires magic scale to really be effective.
Reply With Quote
  #23  
Old April 28th, 2008, 11:36 AM

Ewierl Ewierl is offline
Sergeant
 
Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: Rhode Island, USA
Posts: 359
Thanks: 1
Thanked 0 Times in 0 Posts
Ewierl is on a distinguished road
Default Re: Strands of Astral Power. Worth it?

I wonder if you need(ed) to have the penetration items equipped when casting the ritual? Anyone got the time to test?
Reply With Quote
  #24  
Old April 28th, 2008, 12:10 PM
Tuidjy's Avatar

Tuidjy Tuidjy is offline
Major
 
Join Date: Apr 2004
Location: La La Land (California, USA)
Posts: 1,244
Thanks: 0
Thanked 30 Times in 11 Posts
Tuidjy is on a distinguished road
Default Re: Strands of Astral Power. Worth it?

This is a game in progress, so I would like to avoid spelling it out. But I can
assure you, if penetration items and extra levels were helping, the results
would have to be different. And yes, I had the levels and penetration items at the
time of the casting.

What makes the spell broken, is that the targets benefit fully from magic
resistance, but the caster does not benefit from penetration bonuses. A level
nine spell, cast with a very suitable commander, should not miss eighty out of
eighty possible targets... Yes, my opponents have properly equipped their
commanders. I wish my effort of properly choosing and equipping my caster meant
something too.

And no, I do not buy the argument that the spell is only meant to work in a magic
heavy dominion. I care little about 'the normal mage with MR 13'. At the time
astral strands is likely to be used, battles are fought with commanders with
starting magic resistance of 17-18, and with at least some MR gear.

I mean, I know that my pearls were wasted, and I will not get anything out of this
spell in my game. I just think that this spell is a cool one, and should not be
made worthless by the one-sided way bonuses are taken into account.
__________________
No good deed goes unpunished...
Reply With Quote
  #25  
Old April 28th, 2008, 12:15 PM
vfb's Avatar

vfb vfb is offline
General
 
Join Date: Mar 2007
Location: Japan
Posts: 3,691
Thanks: 269
Thanked 397 Times in 200 Posts
vfb is on a distinguished road
Default Re: Strands of Astral Power. Worth it?

How's your dominion in the province with the enemy mages? Is it 10 candles, or just 1?
__________________
Whether he submitted the post, or whether he did not, made no difference. The Thought Police would get him just the same. He had committed— would still have committed, even if he had never set pen to paper— the essential crime that contained all others in itself. Thoughtcrime, they called it. Thoughtcrime was not a thing that could be concealed forever.
http://z7.invisionfree.com/Dom3mods/index.php?
Reply With Quote
  #26  
Old April 28th, 2008, 12:19 PM
Dedas's Avatar

Dedas Dedas is offline
Lieutenant Colonel
 
Join Date: Nov 2005
Location: Lund, Sweden
Posts: 1,377
Thanks: 72
Thanked 25 Times in 20 Posts
Dedas is on a distinguished road
Default Re: Strands of Astral Power. Worth it?

But you shouldn't expect a spell that relies on a simple magic resistance check to work very well on MR 17-18 units. It's very logical. If you want to lower their MR you do that by magic scale (not in this game of course), penetration artifacts and high magic level. I don't know if the latter works on Strands of Arcane Power but magic scale sure does.
The spell doesn't suck, but it wasn't the best one to cast in your situation.
Reply With Quote
  #27  
Old April 28th, 2008, 12:24 PM
Jazzepi's Avatar

Jazzepi Jazzepi is offline
Major General
 
Join Date: Jan 2004
Location: Columbus, OH
Posts: 2,204
Thanks: 67
Thanked 49 Times in 31 Posts
Jazzepi is on a distinguished road
Default Re: Strands of Astral Power. Worth it?

I don't see the problem with the spell. What's the swing between in MR between drain 2 and magic 3? I think that's pretty significant since it moves you up on a bell curve. It sucks that penetration items apparently don't work with the global, but from Szumo's post it sounds like it works just fine if you're setup for it with a high magic domain.

Jazzepi
Reply With Quote
  #28  
Old April 28th, 2008, 12:51 PM
Tuidjy's Avatar

Tuidjy Tuidjy is offline
Major
 
Join Date: Apr 2004
Location: La La Land (California, USA)
Posts: 1,244
Thanks: 0
Thanked 30 Times in 11 Posts
Tuidjy is on a distinguished road
Default Re: Strands of Astral Power. Worth it?

Jazzepi, the enemy mages in my dominion range from MR 18 to 26, with the majority
at MR 20. The difference between Drain 2 and Magic 3 is 3MR. That would give
a bonus of chance of 8% (Wowsers!) for the wimpiest targets, and no appreciable
bonus for the tough ones.

Mine is a simple argument. If the spell depends on the modified magic resistance
of the target, it should depend on the modified penetration of the caster.
__________________
No good deed goes unpunished...
Reply With Quote
  #29  
Old April 28th, 2008, 01:05 PM

Zeldor Zeldor is offline
General
 
Join Date: Oct 2007
Location: Poland
Posts: 3,414
Thanks: 26
Thanked 73 Times in 49 Posts
Zeldor is on a distinguished road
Default Re: Strands of Astral Power. Worth it?

But that spells is supposed to find enemy MAGES, not commanders. And it is suposed to magic duel/mind burn them unless they have high MR. I don't know about any 8MR mages.
__________________
谋事在人,成事在天。

LA Agartha guide
Reply With Quote
  #30  
Old April 28th, 2008, 01:09 PM
Dedas's Avatar

Dedas Dedas is offline
Lieutenant Colonel
 
Join Date: Nov 2005
Location: Lund, Sweden
Posts: 1,377
Thanks: 72
Thanked 25 Times in 20 Posts
Dedas is on a distinguished road
Default Re: Strands of Astral Power. Worth it?

There is none, but there are LOTS of 13-15 MR mages. With a magic scale of 2 the lowest become as low as 12 making it pretty good chance that they will be damaged.
Reply With Quote
Reply

Bookmarks

Thread Tools
Display Modes

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is On

Forum Jump


All times are GMT -4. The time now is 10:05 PM.


Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.1
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.
Copyright ©1999 - 2024, Shrapnel Games, Inc. - All Rights Reserved.