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Thread: Has the creature Lightning Spell changed?

  
  1. #1

    Default Has the creature Lightning Spell changed?

    I've always liked the creature lightning spell - It looked cool and packed a nice punch

    But just playing Sleepiburgh - I couldn't help but notice that the spell seemed to pack too much of a punch. A team of 6 level 7 Mistresses not only managed to shred the enemy keeper's creatures (all 22 of them - predominantly Dragons / Bile Demons), but as soon as the Lord of the Land appeared (Level 10 knight with a gang of 4 high-level giants) - The mistresses tore through the lot in under 5 seconds. The Knight literally only had a chance to cast Word of Power on the Horned Reaper that sprinted at him... and that was it

    I vaguely recall a few tweaks to the lightning spell (where the damage would be applied over the course of the animation - stacking the set 20 damage) - Can anyone confirm if they've seen similar / know why this may be happening? I know the spell's powerful... but I'm sure it was never this formidable
    Last edited by Mullertime; March 22nd, 2014 at 12:28.

  2. #2
    Awakening Game Master Metal Gear Rex's Avatar
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    Default Re: Has the creature Lightning Spell changed?

    Quote Originally Posted by Mullertime View Post
    I vaguely recall a few tweaks to the lightning spell (where the damage would be applied over the course of the animation - stacking the set 20 damage) - Can anyone confirm if they've seen similar / know why this may be happening? I know the spell's powerful... but I'm sure it was never this formidable
    This wasn't tweaked to be the case. This has always been how the Creature Lightning spell functioned, as well as Drain and Flame Breath. They did damage overtime, so long as the target stayed in the same position. Lightning dealt 20 damage per hit and hit up to 10 times, so up to 200 damage at Level 1. I doubt the Lightning spell was buffed, that would seem very silly as Mistresses and Skeleton spam was already quite powerful.

    Assuming Lightning damage is the same as in vanilla, a Level 7 castor would deal 310% damage of base value, which means 62 damage per Lightning hit for up to 620 damage per cast. With 6 Mistresses, that would be 3720 damage at max per group casting. With Speed, they cast the spell twice as fast, but I can't remember the recharge time for Lightning off the top of my head. It was pretty short though. Knights have 100 Armor in vanilla, and off the top of my head, that's absorbing 39-40% damage. So that would be 1450-1488 damage to the Knight per group casting, assuming the Knight's Armor in FX is the same as in vanilla. Also assuming the Knight's Health is the same as in vanilla (950), a Level 10 Knight would have 3942 Health (415% of base). So he'd die in about three to four group castings if they all focused on him, since apparantly he was too busy casting WoP in order to bother with Heal.

    I'm not bothering with the Giants as I'm fairly certain they've been altered in FX to have higher Health, but I know they have much less Armor than the Knight so they'd probably die faster.

    I might be off on some values if they've been tweaked in FX, but even so, they couldn't have been altered that drastically. So this should give you a good idea as to just how the Mistresses can easily lay waste to this group. Lightning and Mistresses are both overpowered as crap.
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  3. #3
    Elite Dragon Mothrayas's Avatar
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    Default Re: Has the creature Lightning Spell changed?

    In original DK1, spell power didn't scale with creature levels, whereas in KeeperFX it does (20% for each levelup). Thus, in KeeperFX with level 7 mistresses Lightning does 220% of the damage it does in vanilla DK1. This obviously can make quite a difference.

    EDIT: Some math: a level 10 Knight has 3847 health (950 * 4.05) and 100 armor (damage reduced to ~61%). A full-power lightning from a level 7 Mistress would do 10 * 20 * 2.2 = 440 damage, or 440 * 0.61 = 268 damage to the Knight. This would defeat the Knight in 15 hits, or 2-3 Lightnings from each mistress.

    The Giants have 650 base health and 60 armor and would thus obviously go down faster. The Giants in this level are level 7, so they have 650 * 2.1 = 1365 health, and take 336 damage from a full Lightning hit, barely enough to kill them in 4 fully connected Lightning strikes.
    Last edited by Mothrayas; March 22nd, 2014 at 17:18.

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    Awakening Game Master Metal Gear Rex's Avatar
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    Default Re: Has the creature Lightning Spell changed?

    Quote Originally Posted by Mothrayas View Post
    In original DK1, spell power didn't scale with creature levels, whereas in KeeperFX it does (20% for each levelup). Thus, in KeeperFX with level 7 mistresses Lightning does 220% of the damage it does in vanilla DK1. This obviously can make quite a difference.
    Oh it didn't? Huh, I have to wonder where and why I learned that it did. Well that's a pretty big difference, actually. Also I thought that it was a 35% increase, like the normal increase for stats. Whoops.

    This is one thing that I hate about these modifications and stuff running around, sometimes it gets damn confusing to remember what stats go where.
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  5. #5
    KeeperFX Author mefistotelis's Avatar
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    Default Re: Has the creature Lightning Spell changed?

    Maybe the increase is just too high?

    The DamageIncreaseOnExp never existed in original DK. There was only StrengthIncreaseOnExp which affects only melee combat.

    Since DamageIncreaseOnExp affects both melee combat and spells, I think it should be a lot lower.
    Spells are often given at high levels, so their initial damage is quite high.
    I think the DamageIncreaseOnExp should be decreased to 10%, or even lower.

    The way I think is really correct would be to count spell level differently. The fact that creature level equals spell level is a bit strange.
    When a creature receives spell, it should be always lv1 spell - so if a spell is given to a creature in lv8, it goes up with experience only 2 levels - such creature can only master this spell to lv2. With such rules it would make sense to allow higher DamageIncreaseOnExp . Anyway, I'm not able to implement such solution yet.
    Last edited by mefistotelis; March 22nd, 2014 at 19:45.

  6. #6

    Default Re: Has the creature Lightning Spell changed?

    Quote Originally Posted by mefistotelis View Post
    Since DamageIncreaseOnExp affects both melee combat and spells, I think it should be a lot lower.
    Spells are often given at high levels, so their initial damage is quite high.
    I think the DamageIncreaseOnExp should be decreased to 10%, or even lower.

    The way I think is really correct would be to count spell level differently. The fact that creature level equals spell level is a bit strange.
    When a creature receives spell, it should be always lv1 spell - so if a spell is given to a creature in lv8, it goes up with experience only 2 levels - such creature can only master this spell to lv2. With such rules it would make sense to allow higher DamageIncreaseOnExp . Anyway, I'm not able to implement such solution yet.
    I don't think the level increase should only level on levelups. For one that would make the damage really in-transparent, and secondly it will have some very strange results, with for example high level fairies or witches doing very low damage on their later learned spells. In effect, all spells learned at a late level become useless as the early spells will be more powerfull.
    I think lowering the rate spell damage increases would be ok, but simply nerving base damage would also be good. Do I understand this correctly:

    Spell damage:
    DK lvl 1 = DK lvl 10 = FX lvl 1
    FX lvl 10 = 4 x DK lvl 1

    How about change it to:
    DK lvl 1 = FX lvl 6
    FX lvl 10 = 2 x DK lvl 1
    FX lvl 1 = 0.5 x DK lvl 1

  7. #7
    Awakening Game Master Metal Gear Rex's Avatar
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    Default Re: Has the creature Lightning Spell changed?

    Quote Originally Posted by mefistotelis View Post
    The way I think is really correct would be to count spell level differently. The fact that creature level equals spell level is a bit strange.
    When a creature receives spell, it should be always lv1 spell - so if a spell is given to a creature in lv8, it goes up with experience only 2 levels - such creature can only master this spell to lv2. Anyway, I'm not able to implement such solution yet.
    I don't like the idea. It sounds overly complicated. Warlock Meteor would be stronger than Fairy or Wizard Meteor, while Fairy and Wizard Meteor would still be different from one another. It also causes other issues with different abilities in a spell set. Fireball gained at Level 3 for the Wizard would deal 51 - 72 damage at Level 10 depending on whether or not you go with a 10% or 20% damage increase for spells. Wizard Meteor, on the other hand, would do a base 100 damage at that final level. It's not that much of an upgrade for a final spell. Meanwhile, Warlock Meteor at Level 10 would deal 160 - 220 damage, which is significantly more powerful.

    You might find that spells gained at earlier levels are more useful at later levels than the spells actually unlocked at those late levels, which just doesn't work that well. The game isn't really designed with that kind of idea in mind. I don't think it's a totally bad idea on its own, but it's such a dramatic change and really effects the whole game. You'd have to begin adjusting all sorts of spell stats to properly take into account the change of mechanics, which can easily end up being as a huge step away from the original game. It's one of those things that you really have to design the game and stats around. Otherwise, things will be very messy.

    I do think spells need to be nerfed in some way. The problem with spell castors is that in the later levels, they gain all sorts of strong spells that they can cast simultaneously while waiting for other spells to recharge. Each new spell just makes them so much stronger on top of damage increases that I find most melee units to just be outclassed in damage output.

    For a solution, I was thinking more along the lines of having different bonuses for melee and spell damage. Melee damage is the default 20% while spell damage would be 10% or something. This way, in the early levels, when spell castors have just a few spells, the damage isn't that different. Then when they level up, Melee units will have the advantage of more raw damage per melee swing while spell castors have the advantage of a variety of spells to simultaneously cast.

    This way, they'll stay balanced in the early game and will remain balanced in the mid and late game, but will still branch out to function in different ways.
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  8. #8

    Default Re: Has the creature Lightning Spell changed?

    Quote Originally Posted by Metal Gear Rex View Post
    For a solution, I was thinking more along the lines of having different bonuses for melee and spell damage. Melee damage is the default 20% while spell damage would be 10% or something. This way, in the early levels, when spell castors have just a few spells, the damage isn't that different. Then when they level up, Melee units will have the advantage of more raw damage per melee swing while spell castors have the advantage of a variety of spells to simultaneously cast.
    Only downside are the ranged creatures with just 1 or 2 spells, they don't really benefit.

  9. #9
    Awakening Game Master Metal Gear Rex's Avatar
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    Default Re: Has the creature Lightning Spell changed?

    Quote Originally Posted by YourMaster View Post
    Only downside are the ranged creatures with just 1 or 2 spells, they don't really benefit.
    I already thought of that. There's the Mistress, Vampire, Human Archer, and Priestess. The Mistress doesn't really lose much and in fact needs a nerf. Both her spells have a short recharge time, so combined with speed, she's almost always casting something. The Vampire isn't meant for damage so it shouldn't bother him regardless. The Priestess has similar utility functions. The Human Archer... well he kinda sucks regardless to be honest. But at high levels, he's still in a similar boat as the Mistress. I think ultimately he's the one who's hit the worst by this.
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  10. #10

    Default Re: Has the creature Lightning Spell changed?

    Thanks for clearing that up guys That does explain why I noticed some slightly unusual damage outputs from other ranges units

    On paper, I like the idea of ranged-damage upgrade with levels. It does sometimes seem a bit silly that you run around with Level 10 units firing spells at Level 2 damage (Dragons fighting with their default 50 points Fire-Breath was a real gripe!) - But I think the main problem here is that the game wasn't designed for this as such - Ranged units generally 'gained' by increasing their assortment of spells - so whilst the damage output didn't increase: The numbers of shots did

    As it stands - Ranged damage is much greater than mellee, which brutally penalises close-combat units - So not only are some units able to fire from a safe distance, but they can deal more damage too. Going by the numbers above: Lightning can deal up to 200 damage at base level - 50 points more than the Avatar/Reaper's attack - So if this scales, mistresses are actually dealing 33% more than an Avatar's-worth of damage (and always hitting) at safe range

    At the end of the day, mellee should always be stronger and gain a better damage gain - Otherwise ranged units will outclass them in every possible way. So I'm with Rex that they should be handled differently

    I think lowering the rate spell damage increases would be ok, but simply nerving base damage would also be good
    Seconded! Love this idea (I was mulling over something similar over dinner)

    If we're going to increase spell damage/effects with levels up (which is a cool idea) - Then maybe split the boost between mellee and spells (as Metal Gear Rex suggested) to 35% and 10% respectively (even 10% stacks up to give a +135% boost) and reduce a number of the stronger spells, especially damage-over-time (Lightning / Drain / Gas) to about 50-75% of their original power - Even at 50% the 10% boost each level will bring make the spell %17.5 more powerful than the Vanilla DK Counterpart at Level 10

    EDIT:

    Apologies - Found this was already the case! Just found the values mefistotelis was referring to in the creature file under fxdata:

    [experience]
    ; Percentage of creature damage increase for every experience level
    DamageIncreaseOnExp = 20
    ...
    ; Percentage of creature strength increase for every experience level
    StrengthIncreaseOnExp = 35
    So should be an easy fix (as in: No new code required - just a modification of values). Quick question: Does the DamageIncreaseOnExp add or compound with the StrengthIncrease? (As in: Is it a 55% boost to mellee or 62%)
    Last edited by Mullertime; March 22nd, 2014 at 22:44.

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