Path of Elements era

[krotop]

This era is actually an extension of The Path of Summoners made a long time ago by fmunoz that got resurrected and received art edits, care and love by a nostalgic person known as mysticX_th_unknown.

To be honest if that had been just me I would have merged this extension with the PoS add-on, but well, probably due to respect for the original creator fmunoz, mysticX prefered me to release this as a different add-on. So be it.

So what's new in there ? You'll have all the same units, graphics and features as in the Path of Summoner, but what's new is the addition of a spell system that allows you to summon a unit per turn out of your keep (or 2 if they're lvl0) and to cast spells related to the elements you master. So in spirit there's a bit of Master of Monsters, a bit of Magic the Gathering (thrawn if you read this, the Death/Water combination is dedicated to you ), and still a lot of Wesnoth in this mode. Don't be afraid if it looks complex, there's some rule recapitulation and spell explanation as available help menus in-game, so you may grasp the mechanics of it after a little read up.

As always, my primary goal is for you to play and enjoy this mode, but I also appreciate having feedback on it to improve the gameplay. At the current stage the arts aren't quite completly polished, but the main problem is rather coming from a poor balance level and the lack of combinatin specific units. The latest 2 points have yet to be worked on to provide some completion to this mode, but I believe the current version is enjoyable enough to worth a release.

Enjoy your games.

EDIT : 0.3.4 available for playtesting and contains 6 out of the 12 planned combinations of elements.

[Turuk]

It sounds interesting krotop, but I ran into an error. Downloaded the above folder, put it in userdata, went to start a game, it showed up properly, picked Elementalists' Era and a map, got to the leader's screen, but then when I went to start a match I got the error below:

[krotop]

huh... Very sorry about this, then I remove the files until I can figure out what went wrong, because my version works fine. And thanks or noticing and reporting soon this error.

Edit:
Turuk: Did you download the Path of Summoners in the 1st place ? This add-on is needed for Path of Elements to work. I put dependencies=Path_of_Summoners_era and defined the eras in the files to be active only if PoS got downloaded too.

[Turuk]

Not a problem, as per your edit and then our discussion on IRC, it was that I did not have PoS, everything works fine now.

I figured that is what it might be, but because it did not show up as being dependent on that I was not sure and wanted to point it out.

[krotop]

Ok, this is fixed on the add-on server, you are warned about the dependency when trying to download from there.

[mystic x the unknown]

Firstly krotop is overstating my input a bit. I'm pleased to see the era published though.
Other reasons aside, the gameplay of this mod is different from PoS and will only get more so, it should be separate.
I'd like to encourage anyone interested in this era to share their ideas for the possible mixed-elements units and changes to the basic units or spells. I'm sure krotop will be happy.

[fog_of_gold]

Just a great idea, this add-on. But I would say, do not allow to summon and cast a spell in one turn.

[krotop]

Originally, you could either cast a spell, or attack, or summon once a turn, but then spells were almost never used. Now that spellcasting is allowed in addition to a single attack or summon, experience shown me more fluid and dynamic games as well as a more balanced use of each action. Thus, I don't think I'll revert to something closer to the ancient system unless I have a really good reason to do so.

[fog_of_gold]

OK. Now I understand.
Edit:
Another question:
Qhy didn't you include all the other factions? It looks like you've done nearly everythink but didn't include them in [multiplayer_side]. With only this lines, I've include Earth-Life-faction (of course without the combination-unit):

Code: Select all

[multiplayer_side]
	id=POE_Earth_and_Life
	name="&misc/earth_life.png=Master of Earth and Life"
	type=POE_Master_Elementalist_Life_and_Earth
	leader=POE_Master_Elementalist_Life_and_Earth
	recruit=POE_Mystic_Puppet,POE_Magic_Servant,POE_Unicorn,POE_Vine_Beast,POE_Animated_Rock,POE_Mudcrawler
	music="wesnoth-7.ogg"
	terrain_liked=hHm
		[ai]
		recruitment_pattern=fighter,fighter,archer
		[/ai]
[/multiplayer_side]

[krotop]

To make a long story short, I considered some of the combinations to be incomplete, or I wasn't happy on how they were going to be played.

For instance, the earth-life combination is lacking the spell and the unit that will emancipate that faction, and, at the moment, you don't have the opportunity to be a remotely decent agressor, although the defensive abilities of the faction are quite good. Now that actually wouldn't be a problem if 2 players meet and one of them is naturally inclined to attack and have the appropriate master while the other is a earth-life master, but I want the era to be adapted to more varied situations and I fear that no one would pick a faction you're simply incapable to attack with.

So on one hand I didn't want to release a version I didn't think to be playable (as in, not fun to play). On the other hand, a few persons were interested in helping me to develop the era, but argued that it'd be hard to help on finding a decent flow, spirit and balance on incomplete factions without trying 1st. So I decided to finish the coding of a few of them, and mysticX polished their arts, in order to have a playable era including 6 out of the 12 planned factions, which was quite enough work to balance and tweak for different playstyles already.

But, as you saw, there are still remnants of the 6 other factions since that add-on is a branch inspired of the Path of Summoners which included the 12 factions, and I had a set of spells readied for each of them (although I'm not happy with all of them).

[fog_of_gold]

For instance, the earth-life combination is lacking the spell and the unit that will emancipate that faction, and, at the moment, you don't have the opportunity to be a remotely decent agressor, although the defensive abilities of the faction are quite good. Now that actually wouldn't be a problem if 2 players meet and one of them is naturally inclined to attack and have the appropriate master while the other is a earth-life master, but I want the era to be adapted to more varied situations and I fear that no one would pick a faction you're simply incapable to attack with.

Well I like this faction and I think, the combinationspell is very strong. If you are able to cast spells, you are able to be attacked, too. With this, your Summoner can get more than half of it's max_hitpoints, if they are in a village. You do not need gold, if you summon by moving to the emenies so 10 gold isn't much, if you need that. And it isn't true, that you can't attack with them. For example, the unicorns are very aggresive, if they attack. The mudcrawler and vine beasts, for example are very balanced in attack and defense

So on one hand I didn't want to release a version I didn't think to be playable (as in, not fun to play). On the other hand, a few persons were interested in helping me to develop the era, but argued that it'd be hard to help on finding a decent flow, spirit and balance on incomplete factions without trying 1st. So I decided to finish the coding of a few of them, and mysticX polished their arts, in order to have a playable era including 6 out of the 12 planned factions, which was quite enough work to balance and tweak for different playstyles already.

When we can tell the ai casting spells, we can only let 2 ais fight against for the coarse balance and for the fine balance, we have to test by humans, for which we need all factions. I don't think, that it will disturb too much, if the fations aren't balanced and finished yet. If someone is hurt of this, he'll say that (I hope).

But, as you saw, there are still remnants of the 6 other factions since that add-on is a branch inspired of the Path of Summoners which included the 12 factions, and I had a set of spells readied for each of them (although I'm not happy with all of them).

You allready discribed them in-game and they sounds sometimes very interesting(for example light).

[fmunoz]

I made some changes in the last version of the PoS adding a new earth unit instead of mudcrawler (now only water+earth get it)
Only for 1.7/1.8 version.

[fog_of_gold]

And where are these changes?

[krotop]

@fmunoz : Yes I saw your update on PoS I like that new unit a lot and think it opens new perspectives for the missing factions. It will definitly replace the mudcrawler when I take the time to update seriously PoE, which is not easy currently. But that unit alone doesn't prevent earth/water and earth/life to be missing a good enough mix of units/spells, unfortunately.

@lots_of_gold : You will find the Path of Summoners the same way you found the Path of Elements, on the add-on menu. Anounces about this add-on are made in that thread.
About the unicorn, mudcrawler, and vinebeast, they're all decent at their respective role, but none of them is well suited for line breaking if your opponent doesn't want to leave the good terrain.
About the rejuvenation spell, it is more or less ok in my opinion. Not the most fun spell, but it makes the master such a resilient battle leader that it actually leads to a different approach when controling that faction, and I like the masters approaches to be different. Though, you don't win by attacking every turn with your king, firstly because you can't summon at the same time, and that you'll quickly feel alone if you never summon, secondly because the attack power of the masters has been nerfed enough to avoid them to be a one-man army.
Anyway, this doesn't solve the fact that the earth/life doesn't have an earth/life unit nor a decent way to break a solid defense.

[fog_of_gold]

@lots_of_gold : You will find the Path of Summoners the same way you found the Path of Elements

I haven't found them both on the add-on menu, I've found them both in the PoS forum. PoS was there allready and there was a link to this a little bit older forum

, on the add-on menu.

I'm to silly to find this. Are you so nice to give a link?

Anounces about this add-on are made in that thread.

I know this forum allready, but thank you for your trouble

About the unicorn, mudcrawler, and vinebeast, they're all decent at their respective role, but none of them is well suited for line breaking if your opponent doesn't want to leave the good terrain.

Well, only in a lineformation. And this formation have lots of disadvantages. You can use your Summoner to break lines or let that do your allies. But If you do two lines with one line animated Pocks and one line Unicorns, your emenies nearly won't be able to break, but with your Unicorns you can break there lines. There are much space for tactics so let us just test. If you think, they do too less damage, let the combination be aggressive, maybe a mutated Troll.

About the rejuvenation spell, it is more or less ok in my opinion. Not the most fun spell, but it makes the master such a resilient battle leader that it actually leads to a different approach when controling that faction, and I like the masters approaches to be different.

That's my opinion, too.

Though, you don't win by attacking every turn with your king, firstly because you can't summon at the same time, and that you'll quickly feel alone if you never summon, secondly because the attack power of the masters has been nerfed enough to avoid them to be a one-man army.

Then just deffend at disturbing positions and summon your creatures

Anyway, this doesn't solve the fact that the earth/life doesn't have an earth/life unit nor a decent way to break a solid defense.

Than just let us invent a decent aggrssive unit. It'll be the combinationunit.

And by the way..my name isn't lots_of_gold, it's fog_of_gold. But not too important. If you like, just call me lots_of_gold.

Edit:
I think the mystic puppets are a little bit too strong for level 0 creatures. the prize is balanced, but because you can summon two level 0 creatures, I most summon these. You have to make they a little bit weaker and cheaper like in the PoS.