Legend of the Invincibles

[dabber]

Death Knights advance from Revenants, so you can get them.

I see that now. The help does not show that, either under Death Knight or under Revenant. If I conjure the "correct" Death Knight, his help will show he comes from Revenant, but that help screen cannot be accessed by any other means I can find.

[Dugi]

I can't hide the 'incorrect' one, so I had to hide the 'correct' one and assume that the differences are neglectful.

[dabber]

Now that I can get the units ...
Lich King cannot use a staff, but he is largely a spell caster.
Death Lord has an AMLA for "better resistance (improved resistances, but -1% arcane)". It improves blade, pierce and cold, but doesn't touch impact or fire. I feel like the cold was meant to be impact, but perhaps not. At minimum I'd suggest a wording improvement to "better resistance (bonus blade, pierce, cold, but -1% arcane)"

[Dugi]

I forgot to allow him to use staves, fixing that.

Death Lord's better resistances is focusing on the usual skeleton-style resistances, cold, blade, pierce. It will be more specific, that's a good suggestion.

[dabber]

I'm just into Chapter 9 and have met Burning Souls. They seem to have 0% defense (always get hit) on every terrain. Burning Souls in general are extremely wimpy ... level 4 enemies shouldn't be a threat to anything by this point.

Grammar:
Fabrienne says "I am a seal guardian, I do never underestimate what I should not underestimate".
Remove the "do". "I never underestimate what I should not underestimate"

[dabber]

WEAPON_SPECIAL_HORROR has name = "horrid"

Grammar: Lilith at one point says "...Now we know where did she teleport to. Into Foul Pits, a cave system ..."
I think it would be better to write "Now we know where she teleports to. She goes into Foul Pits, a cave system ..."

I'm surprised by all the Burning Souls and Imps in Grim Port. It seems like that huge castle should be more of a challenge.

[orian34]

i finished the campaign and i wanted to say something about the evil gardens in the 9 chapter.
It is very long to end one turn cause of the checkof every unit but perhaps if they are petrified unless there are an ennemy unit close to them would be less powereating...don't know.

[dabber]

I think there is a bug in feeding. I see a pop-up about "+1 max HP" when I kill them. Sometimes. Well, most of the time. Maybe all the time.

Bug in redeem AMLAs. The one for improved impact resistance is named resist_fire1
Is it intentional that the max_times for the resistance improvements are different? Fire, Arcane and Impact are max 4. Blade is max 3. Pierce and cold are max 2. Seems like they should all be max 4.

[dabber]

Grammar:
In Land of Misery, Lethalia says "Can you see that fortress in distance?"
It should be "Can you see that fortress in the distance?"

Uria (avatar) shows up and says "This is just a projection of me, a lesser avatar. If you destory it, nothing happens to me. But if you will not destroy it, that is very likely to happen, something will happen to you...."
Better would be "... But if you do not destroy it, which is very likely to happen, ..."

[Dugi]

I'm just into Chapter 9 and have met Burning Souls. They seem to have 0% defense (always get hit) on every terrain. Burning Souls in general are extremely wimpy ... level 4 enemies shouldn't be a threat to anything by this point.

It's intentional that they have always 0% defence. They want to get hit so that they could die and be freed.
So do you think that they should be made harder?

Fabrienne says "I am a seal guardian, I do never underestimate what I should not underestimate".

Thanks for telling. There was also a typo in the first underestimate. Btw, the seal guardian names are automatically generated, specifying their names is useless, it's more useful for me to know the location.

WEAPON_SPECIAL_HORROR has name = "horrid"

Many weapon specials have different names in macro names, but in this case there was no reason for it.

I'm surprised by all the Burning Souls and Imps in Grim Port. It seems like that huge castle should be more of a challenge.

Made the demon-recruiter recruit more.

I think there is a bug in feeding. I see a pop-up about "+1 max HP" when I kill them. Sometimes. Well, most of the time. Maybe all the time.

I am aware of this bug but I have't quite figured out what might be the cause. It looks like if the usual feeding (from the flora) was activated for some reasons when the feeder died and the +1 max HP text appeared above the nearest surviving unit.

Bug in redeem AMLAs. The one for improved impact resistance is named resist_fire1

I wonder how do you find those. Thanks for reporting.

Is it intentional that the max_times for the resistance improvements are different?

Yes, but the reason is quite outdated. It was formerly meant to disallow the preserved liches from getting some resistances too high (they usually have high cold and pierce resistance, as other undead), but the same advancements are shared with demigods and it does not make much sense there. Furthermore, considering the number of resistance increasing items and the fact that the preserved liches resistances were decreased for the sake of balance, it is not really important.

Regarding your grammar corrections, are you a native speaker of English language (sorry if I asked that already)? Usually I agree with your points regarding grammar, sometimes I don't but I assume that you know better so I'd like to know how reasonable is it to assume that you know better.

____________________________________________
@orian34
I don't understand what do you mean. Do you mean with 'evil garden'? Some specific scenario? Chapter 9 generally? What petrification (didn't you mistake this campaign's content with cockatrices from Invation from the Unknown or After the Storm)? What do you mean with 'powereating'?

[dabber]

Yes, I am a native English speaker. Previous posts along those lines are why I try to post about word choice when I see them.

I think orian34 was saying the "plants" in chapter 9 seem to take a lot of AI time. I decided to redeem most of them in one scenario and AI move time definitely declined as the plant numbers declined, even when the flowers do absolutely nothing every turn.


I saw the bit about the burning souls wanting to die, but I didn't connect that to 0% defense. Okay. Maybe 10% would be better, just to look less like an error? No biggie, sorry for bothering you about it.
More importantly, so far (7 scenarios?) Chapter 9 is shockingly easy. I see some level 7-10 enemies, but I have met lots and lots of level 4 or below. With 20 elite veterans accumulated over the previous chapters, level 4 enemies are nothing. I'm only using 14 recalls and sometimes some of them never move or never engage an enemy. An almost random group of 3 equipped veterans faces very low risk just wading into groups of level 4 or less enemies. At least on HARD difficulty, I think chapter 9 should have nothing below level 5 except maybe the plants.
To be more concrete, so far chapter 9 looks easier than chapter 8, and I was concerned chapter 8 was getting too easy. Maybe I'm too hardcore a player, but I often want Wesnoth HARD to be harder. Abaddon, Lilith, Uria projection and the first seal guardian required some caution for them personally, but their armies were not scary. I would expect to see them with escorts of level 10s, but they had level 7s mixed with lower levels. As long as I do something useful to prevent the boss from killing someone, 8 or 10 of my troops can crush the boss's army in a couple turns.

As I see it, a unit with some equipment is worth a level 5. A unit with good equipment is worth a level 6. A unit with good equipment and some AMLAs is worth at least a level 7, and many AMLAs raises that to level 8 or more.

[orian34]

Thanks dabber, i did not choose the right words.
I was speaking of a way to "freeze"(like petrification) the evil flowers until an unit gets close to it...it would highly reduce the time of IA turns.

edit : I agrre with what's written below!

[Aevyn]

I'd like to get involved with some of this discussion. A LOT of stuff has been posted.

Legacy Analysis

First, my personal review of legacies and preference. Keep in mind that this is purely my opinion. I'll avoid commenting on legacies I think are okay.

1) Kings -- fine
2) Sorrow -- fine
3) Undead -- Changes Needed; Read Below
4) Titans (Latest version) -- fine; Modifications Proposed; Read Below
5) Light -- fine
6) Dragon Legacies -- Changes Needed; Request Removal or significant modification.

***Legacy of Darkness --- Legacy Suggestion for consideration; Read Below
***Legacy of the Divines --- Legacy Suggestion for consideration; Read Below
***Legacy of the Heroes --- Mechanics suggestion for consideration; Read Below

I haven't had a chance to observe Legacy of the Phoenix yet.


Legacy of the Undead: The resistance malus associated with this legacy may seem harsh, but physical resistances gained *may* prove to be adequate compensation. It's situational and largely dependent on the unit itself. Therefore, I'd suggest adding "Turn into Lich upon death" as the final AMLA for this legacy. With Tome of the Liches now being rare with many new items in the mix, this would provide a new pathway for creating liches. However, this transformation should be the absolute last AMLA as liches should still be somewhat of a rarity (or something that has to be earned).

Legacy of the Titans: Personally, I think the recent changes to this legacy are fair. If it seems a bit bland, perhaps add regeneration +8 (or even +16) as the final AMLA reward. Reaching it would require many advancements within the legacy and thus wouldn't be so unbalanced.

Dragon Legacies: These are pretty useless and generic; I hate having a good unit receive them. The only remotely useful one would be the Dark Dragon Legacy which possesses a Breath attack with drain, but enemy resistances render this and all the other breath attacks worthless. Resistances given by these legacies can also be better provided by gear. I'd advocate removing them entirely and replacing them with the following.

[LEGACY SUGGESTION] Legacy of Darkness: basically the dark version of legacy of light, adding the ability to darken, become chaotic, and turn enemies into undead (soulless) as the final AMLA

[LEGACY SUGGESTION] Legacy of the Divines: This would provide AMLAs that 1) make the unit liminal, 2) add chaotic to weapons, 3) add lawful to weapons, 4) one time arcane resistance boost, 5) make weapon damage type arcane.

[MECHANICS SUGGESTION] Legacy of the Heroes: Efraim and Lethalia are special units who will never run out new AMLA abilities. However, long term normal units that have killed enough enemies lose advancement options quickly. Thus, as a final suggestion, I request that units be granted a second special legacy ("Legacy of the Heroes") after a certain experience amount is reached (2500xp maybe). It could function as a random grab bag of select special abilities ("Freezing aura", "16 hp burn", "immunity to poison, plague", "Leadership of a level 6 unit", etc) as a reward for the veteran unit. With the steep xp curve, gaining these abilities (and any additional AMLAs in it) won't be easy.

If you bothered to read the above, you have my thanks. Legacies are the greatest source of diversification among units and so I'd like them to be interesting and allow for a great amount of versatility.

[dabber]

Bug in redeem AMLAs. The one for improved impact resistance is named resist_fire1

I wonder how do you find those. Thanks for reporting.

This one, and the previous one about half god magical vs physical, I find because I have been making many choices in favor of higher resistance. In both cases, I was expecting to be offered an AMLA that didn't show up, so I went looking at the code. I write embedded software for a living, so digging through code is normal. I mostly understand how/why your abilities work, I understand much of the items code and most scenarios. I haven't looked much at unusual units (like burning souls) or chapter utilities.

Which reminds me ... some spawn points in chapter 9 clearly do not work. I have played a dozen plus turns on multiple maps with a guy parked next to a portal and nothing ever came out of it. But other portals have spawned someone about every other turn.


@Legacies
Kings: Now that I have used it, I like Legacy of Kings a lot more. I would even suggest weakening it to 6 separate AMLAs for 10/15/20 damage and 5/10/15 resist.
Sorrow: I could see weakening the Conviction to 15. HOWEVER, currently Wesnoth is bugged (Wesnoth, not LotI), and the weaker of two Conviction values is used, so I'm kinda against messing around with Conviction amounts at this time.
Undead: Because of the resistance penalties, Undead is extremely situational. I used it on a Dwarf Protector, where Adamant means Undead Legacy doesn't really hurt him (of course, the resistances also don't help). Basically he spent four AMLAs and got melee leech and immune to poison and plague. I could also see using it on someone with high arcane resistance, like a prophet or celestial messenger. HOWEVER, Undead Legacy should be relatively a lot better in part 1 than in part 2, because part 1 has a lot less arcane and fire damage.
Titans: I still like Titans. Sure it isn't game changing, but it is strictly better than options all units have.
Dragons: I disagree about the draining attack being useful - the slow on Ice Dragon is far better to me. Perhaps the biggest thing is the breath attacks aren't strong enough, partly because they are hard to improve with equipment.

Legacy of the Divindes: Being liminal is a WEAKNESS ... why would you want that AMLA?

Legacy of Heroes: I'd rather add something to craft books from gems. Either formulas, or smash one Black Pearl or two Sapphires or three Amethysts and get a random book. Reminds me, I need to make my guys read more books ...

[Aevyn]

@Dabber

Legacy of the Kings: I see no reason to reduce the magnitude or modify this legacy. The bonuses and advancements are adequate without being overpowered.

Legacy of Sorrow: I tend to agree with Dugi in creating a damage malus; Doing so is more creative and I'd prefer it to simply nerfing the bonuses for no specific or quantifiable reason. Not to mention it elegantly fits with the theme "sorrow"

Dragon Legacies: Dark Breath (the draining attack) also slows. It trumps Ice Breath and the other Dragon Legacies in every way. Dark Dragon Legacy is the only one I'd support keeping; the other legacies are inferior advancements opportunities that the player should invest elsewhere

Legacy of Titans: Agreed. It's fine in my opinion; see my prior post

In response to some of my suggested legacies above

Legacy of the Divines: "liminal" was a mistake. I meant neutral.

Also, I'm against the crafting of books from gems, especially if the crafting requirements aren't very high. Honestly, I'd prefer if the player weren't able to predetermine the additional abilities each unit receives. Books can be stored and used later, yes, but there are no guarantees you'll drop the one you want. Also, crafting books from gems doesn't physically make sense.