Upgrade the Shadow

JW · Post by JW » April 25th, 2006, 7:52 pm

I had the thought yesterday, after playing some Age of Heroes MP, that the Shadow is still weak compared to his brother the Wraith. He's pretty devastating in night attacks, but he's easily killed once he deals his backstab damage. He has no ranged defensive weapon, and he deals less melee damage than the Wraith (when not backstabbing), and without drain. To compensate for this he gets Nightstalk and +1hp. His Nightstalk is useless once he's made an attack - he's now visible for a turn; so the only benefit the Shadow now has over the Wraith is his +1hp.

This is a real bummer. Now I know Shadows are used much differently than Wriaths, and that they are quite devastating when they get their backstab. The problem is, that I see, is that in any situation where you might level up into a Shadow (for Deafault play), you would almost always want to level into a Wraith. This has been mentioned before, I know.

Since it would probably be overkill to add more damage or resistance to the Shadow, I think his hp should be boosted slightly to make him longer-lasting and a more appealing choice when compared to the Wraith.

I don't know exactly how much of a boost would be appropriate, but I was thinking 28 or 29 hp and then 38 or so hp for the Nightgaunt - that's about a 10% increase. (Just to get the ball rolling.)

Since the Shadow cannot regain hp like the Wraith - or even the level 1 Ghost! - I think the unit should be compensated by some amount of hp increase.

Cuyo Quiz · Post by **Cuyo Quiz** » April 25th, 2006, 10:31 pm

Seconded. That or augment its worst resistances so he becomes the real almost invulnerable unit.

Dragon Master · Post by **Dragon Master** » April 25th, 2006, 11:15 pm

thirded. So far whenever I see a ghost level up to a shadow, I can kill it next turn

Post by **Zhukov** » April 26th, 2006, 1:52 am

Half-baked idea of mine:

Give it Regeneration.
The Shadow could be made into something that can make extremely nasty strikes (with backstab), however take a whole load of damage in return, then hopefully limp off to recover (with the help of Nightstalk and perhaps some friendly ZoC).

Anyone else think this could work? It would be somewhat more interesting then raising HP.

PS. That is poorly explained. Apologies.

kshinji · Post by **kshinji** » April 26th, 2006, 12:20 pm

i agree - it should have regeneration, and it woulkd solve the problem with a bit of balancing. Give me reason why he losses it?

yeeha · Post by **yeeha** » April 26th, 2006, 3:59 pm

I agree too, everytime i take shadow i am asked why did u take him

and i regret trying to make use of backstab over wraith 1-2 turns later

.

Elvish_Pillager · Post by **Elvish_Pillager** » April 26th, 2006, 8:49 pm

Don't upgrade the Shadow, downgrade the Wraith. Make its melee weaker and do Cold damage.

Post by **Ken_Oh** » April 26th, 2006, 9:47 pm

Undead is my fave faction, but I think I have to agree with EP on this one.

Alks · Post by **Alks** » April 26th, 2006, 10:03 pm

Elvish Pillager wrote:Don't upgrade the Shadow, downgrade the Wraith. Make its melee weaker and do Cold damage.

Not so harshly. EITHER decrease melee OR do Cold damage. Wraiths are powerful, but they are important to the faction - they have to be powerful. That's why I'm also for giving regeneration to Shadow - he has to be a good alternative.

Elvish_Pillager · Post by **Elvish_Pillager** » April 26th, 2006, 10:26 pm

Alks wrote:
Elvish Pillager wrote:Don't upgrade the Shadow, downgrade the Wraith. Make its melee weaker and do Cold damage.
Not so harshly. EITHER decrease melee OR do Cold damage.

What, is the Cold damage type some sort of disadvantage? I always thought of it as mildly better than Blade, in general.

The main reason I said to change to cold is that reducing the melee damage without switching to cold would result in RIPLIB concerns.

JW · Post by JW » April 26th, 2006, 11:10 pm

It would be nice if the Wraith did Cold, but I remember that idea being shot down. I would prefer to keep the Cold drain on the ghost because the RIPLB is really annoying versus every faction except Rebels and Undead. Undead v Undead won't create any Wraiths though.

Cuyo Quiz · Post by **Cuyo Quiz** » April 27th, 2006, 2:24 am

*checks*

It doesn't do Cold?. Well, unless someone start spamming bats and their Cold res i guess one shouldn't have problems.

Now... why it was decided none should do Cold. One of them must, right?.

Post by **Ken_Oh** » April 27th, 2006, 3:50 am

Wraiths do have cold damage, it's just only on their ranged Wail attack. I wonder if that was the reasoning behind not giving their sword cold damage as well.
'
I also think it's cheap to give Wraiths blade damage because then it negates how fearsome I think Woses should be to Undead.

Yeah, I'd really like to see the thread where this idea got shot down.

toms · Post by **toms** » April 27th, 2006, 11:44 am

What about less movement costs in water for the shadow?

Or downgrade the wraith by regiving the complete holy weakness (-100%)?

...

Silence of Echo · Post by **Silence of Echo** » April 28th, 2006, 2:48 pm

toms wrote:What about less movement costs in water for the shadow?

Or downgrade the wraith by regiving the complete holy weakness (-100%)?

...

The undead already have enough movement over water. The holy weakness would only be for rebels or loyalists. no one else does holy damage.