What is Arcane? - Suggestions by matto

[Dalas120]

It seems like your main problem with old arcane is that there weren't enough arcane resistant units, correct?

More or less. While there are a lot of arcane-resistant units - humans, saurians, monsters, etc - in practice arcane isn't commonly countered. Loyalists are great arcane counters, but are rare enemies. Outlaws and saurians have good arcane resist and are common-ish enemies, but they often rely on high dodge, which is still countered by the MoL/Enchantress/etc.

however I disagree with the idea of increasing the orcs' resistance to arcane.

Worth noting - even in 1.16, arcane resistance were kinda random. Humans/saurians with 20%, orcs/merfolk/naga with 0%, some monsters with 20% (like bears) but others with 0% (like wolves), cave spiders and gryphons randomly having 10% for some reason (even gryphons that aren't being ridden by dwarves).

As far as I know there's never really been any clear lore behind 0%-10%-20% (besides guesses like "well maybe bears are more mundane than wolves"), or any reason why some races were picked to get 20% while others were picked to get 0%.

I think the best solution is the one proposed by Jonathan Kelly on github - "I may have a solution for you that will not upset the community while making campaigns generally more interesting - significant new race=mechanical units with very high arcane resistance.".

Yeah, I agree. JK talked a little about new mechanical orcish units with us in the discord, and I wholeheartedly support a solution like that. But I'd want to actually see some mechanical orcish units make it into core (or close to it) before balancing around their hypothetical.

[matto]

Hello, on december 17th you mentioned that you would provide a reply to people's feedback about arcane resistances, but when should we expect to receive it?

I would appreciate it if you could share your specific reply, hopefully this week. Regards.

Thanks for this, i was kinda slacking off (holidays, playing games etc.. )

I do even "better", one week answer all... hopefully the future me doesn't let me and you down

Practically? The balance team hasn't talked about arcane in a while. So far no specific proposal that any of us have brought up has been popular enough to have a chance at passing a vote.

As others already said, the 1.4-1.16 arcane was better, it should be properly reverted to those values. People supported forming a balance team with the expectation that they will actually listen to the community instead of trying to force their own vision onto the game.

I agree Dalas & Rears, there has not been any popular proposal so far, but i have to repeat that Matto and SkyEnd are strongly towards a reverse, despite Henje's AR in part favouring Default/Heros Era balance and new addition.

{But it was decided that we need a 4 Yes out of 5 to approve internally the Voting}

Which is what active people [on the forum] want, unless someone does an Official Community Voting, otherwise we should follow the feedback we have.

And btw i did this post mostly to explore the potential around the idea of Henjewar Arcane Rework and What is Arcane, i am happy enough that people consider there is some good in my Magic/Arcane "analisis" xD ... Rather than follow through with my stats proposal.


Official Community Voting - Community Manager time to shine!?

There is some inactivity in the Balance Team and BIG misinformation towards the Community, so what i am proposing is to actually start to use Wesnoth Official Youtube, Reddit, Discord, Twitter and Steam Annocement Page; not only for version release, but for us Balance Team to know Community preference towards possibile changes and in a bigger scale (making/testing new modes, adding existing addon to mainline etc..)
[and yeah, i kinda want to screw with you people xD]

Having the whole Community participation is quite crucial for a flourishing Wesnoth... as a Competitive Player i feel a bit frustation when i find little to zero Nicknames representative of my side.

May a step for people to get sucked in the lore/techincal aspect of Wesnoth gets us to a better place.

---------- Anyway leaving that aside when an answer comes from Community Manager ----------

Tomorrow i will write about what i gathered from/out this discussion, problems/solutions people have...

A] Resistances changing between Levels.

B] Animals (and generally Creatures) special properties.

C] ChaosRider - Extra Damage Types.

D] Henjewar's Arcane Rework vs Revert to [1.16]

E] Goblin, Orcs, Saurians - Race to Arcane Difference.

F] Naming Attacks - Help Lore/Gameplay?

[ChaosRider]

Choose c option! New damage types its what we all wants too! Heh.

[name]

Official Community Voting

Getting wider community feedback is important for showing us where we can improve. But I am not sure simple polls and voting are a good way to go, particularly for controversial topics, because it is too easy for them to be skewed by alternate accounts and such.

[Refumee]

There is some inactivity in the Balance Team and BIG misinformation towards the Community, so what i am proposing is to actually start to use Wesnoth Official Youtube, Reddit, Discord, Twitter and Steam Annocement Page; not only for version release, but for us Balance Team to know Community preference towards possibile changes and in a bigger scale (making/testing new modes, adding existing addon to mainline etc..)
[and yeah, i kinda want to screw with you people xD]

Having the whole Community participation is quite crucial for a flourishing Wesnoth... as a Competitive Player i feel a bit frustation when i find little to zero Nicknames representative of my side.

That's true the community is a big and important part about wesnoth.

But I wonder how voting is affected, with each of my accounts? I got a youtube, discord, reddit and so on account.
Others may have alt accounts.
Can they vote twice thrice?

If yes that would be bad and will manipulate the voting system.


Another point is, maybe that's always the problem with democracy, how good informed are the voters?
For example revert arcane to 1.16. I bet most people don't even know what that means or encompasses. What it means to their favorite UMC campaign they wanna play in 1.18 but is never get ported or feels different for no apparent reason in their eyes.

Why I am saying this? I saw biased voting from YouTube accounts once, since I am more active in this community. I could say they got different information a different view from their favorite YouTube creator (I am not saying names) in comparison to people who don't watch those videos, let's say discord users.

[KameRamen]

I agree with Kelly and Refumee. I think that polls and voting do more harm than benefit, as they carry considerable risks of inaccurate results. I do not believe it is desirable to turn to risky approaches, especially since this discussion has such great role to play in the future of the game.

[Skyend]

I agree 0 feedback clearly better than the potential risk of manipulation and inaccuracy.

But don't be shocked about balancing changes when 1.20 comes out in 1.5 years.
Anyway, once we the balancing team are pleased with our changes, I'd host some tournaments. (And ask igorbat/catbog to add it for autohost isar or so)

I'm interested in all kinds of feedback, but preferable written explained reasoning and not just calling something bad (still better than nothing).

[Roge_Tebnelok]

Getting wider community feedback is important for showing us where we can improve. But I am not sure simple polls and voting are a good way to go, particularly for controversial topics, because it is too easy for them to be skewed by alternate accounts and such.

Yeah, anonymous poll or survey anywhere aren't good options, voting on other platforms will make it harder to sum up the feedback, with risk of manipulation. With public forum discussion and links to it is harder to covertly influence the results.

That's true the community is a big and important part about wesnoth.

But I wonder how voting is affected, with each of my accounts? I got a youtube, discord, reddit and so on account.
Others may have alt accounts.
Can they vote twice thrice?

If yes that would be bad and will manipulate the voting system.


Another point is, maybe that's always the problem with democracy, how good informed are the voters?
For example revert arcane to 1.16. I bet most people don't even know what that means or encompasses. What it means to their favorite UMC campaign they wanna play in 1.18 but is never get ported or feels different for no apparent reason in their eyes.

Why I am saying this? I saw biased voting from YouTube accounts once, since I am more active in this community. I could say they got different information a different view from their favorite YouTube creator (I am not saying names) in comparison to people who don't watch those videos, let's say discord users.

Right, another thing is, even if we lay out the situation in front of the voters, even if we include different points of view, the fact that it's a vote restricts them to a choice from given options, because suggestions may differ and likely won't be supported. Without their own opinions there isn't a way to determine the experience or reason for the choice of community member, it similarises the value of a vote from more experienced player and from less experienced, which makes their feedback less useful, especially if questions are too vague or the player misunderstands them.

I agree 0 feedback clearly better than the potential risk of manipulation and inaccuracy.

But don't be shocked about balancing changes when 1.20 comes out in 1.5 years.
Anyway, once we the balancing team are pleased with our changes, I'd host some tournaments. (And ask igorbat/catbog to add it for autohost isar or so)

I'm interested in all kinds of feedback, but preferable written explained reasoning and not just calling something bad (still better than nothing).

Agree, forum discussions are more free and open, it's easier to ask questions when you are not sure, and writing a detailed post isn't restricted as much. Also, because official multiplayer requires a forum account, experience of people who play it can be verified through multiplayer game records, and roughly half of the community plays MP, so we can be more sure about their level of understanding. And even for SP-only players, people who have an active forum account are more often people who provide feedback for campaigns they play, or even develop their own content, which also shows some experience. We should aim for quality of opinions rather than quantity, simple dis/agreement can also be helpful, but detailed posts even more so.
I think for this one a separate thread should be created and links to it provided on other platforms, raised awareness will prevent more concerned people from being surprised by upcoming changes.

[dwarftough]

My position is that voting is certainly a bad idea here. Questions like this (arcane damage) should not be decided by voting. Nor voting is a good way to collect feedback. Casual players often don't care about balance that much, and they aren't informed to make a well-explained choice. And, as others have mentioned, the risks of voting manipulation arise. We don't want to mess with it. I also think voting will undermine the idea of the balance team itself, as it was formed specifically to have a dedicated team working on balance issues instead of chaotic flame wars in disorganized threads.

Even though voting is out of question, we can try to improve the communication to the player base. Posting more updates, announcements, inviting folks to participate in discussions: those are definitely things we may do. I've already been discussing ways with matto and I'll think about what steps we all can do in that direction.

Hosting testing tournaments is also a nice idea that I support.

[matto]

Giving bonus to resistance per level honestly makes no sense. Rather, I think this will have negative effects for both lore/gameplay. My concern is particularly the tactical aspect. As I believe someone already pointed out earlier, any unit with higher level (increased HP and attacks) is a threat to the attacker by itself. Therefore, if the resistance changes strongly per level, it will make that unit more difficult to defeat for no apparent reason, thus worsening the gameplay.

Yeah i see, Resistance staying the same between levels favours simplicity for gameplay, otherwise making counters less effective the stronger the foe becomes, so rather than pushing for this change into Core Units...

Vampire Bat: Change [lvl0-1] +10% and [lvl2] +20% or [1.16] Revert +20%
Ghouls: Change [lvl1] +10% [lvl2] +20% [lvl3] +30%
Skeletons: Change [lvl1-2] -40% [lvl3] -30% or [1.16] Revert -50%

... my hope is that we would be able to use this idea in campaigns.

Consisting in, DIFFERENTIATING the way INCREASE OF DIFFICULTY is done {instead of just giving more gold to AI and less gold to the Player}, by adding more obstacles making them unexpected. [maybe adding a little bit of touch to the story too]

I dont like the changes to the undead and I don't like that they are getting stronger with each lvl up. Are they getting more natural while leveling? Shouldn't that be the other way around?
I am not suggesting making them worse with each level.
I am only questioning why they are getting stronger.
I am open for discussion to give the lich a different arcane resist.

For the other races I do support your ideas. There should be a reason why someone has a higher resistance.
Silver mages train to be anti mages, so they are having 50% resist to fire and cold.
That is also quite cool lorewise.

As for the Lore Aspect, you can justify it the same way Mages get better Resistances because of training, so an experienced Necromancer would be able to cast a protection spell on the Undead minions, consider that in campaigns {such as in Easter Invasion} there are "Holy" Water Vials that give arcane properties to attacks. [Wesnoth doesn't really have crazy strict rules, huh :p]

To answer: "Are Undeads getting more natural while leveling?"

Instead of "NATURALNESS", which depends on the point of view, what the arcane resistance represents could be better described as "OTHERWORLDLINESS".

You can use a more fitting word like Roge, i went with Naturalness because it felt more "natural" [a bit of trolling xD], it has simple synonyms/contrary or word alike, which made it easy to understand, for me.

Otherworldliness sounds great for complex talks, which i wanna do in the future.
[Essence, Soul/Spirit, Domains ~~ gonna look into campaigns more to elaborate on it, but i believe this will result into brainstorming & make sh*t up]

1) arcane damage should be especially good against undead, and should be consistent within and across most races
2) arcane-dealing units should be fine but not great against many *common* situations/factions/etc; enough to balance out their extra power vs undead.
3) arcane resistances should be at least somewhat backwards-compatible with UMC/campaigns designed around 1.16 and prior

A full revert to 1.16 would achieve #1 and #3, but not #2. To achieve #2 I'd prefer for orcs and humans/saurians/etc to have the same arcane resist (whether that be 0%, 10%, or 20%), with undead at -50% or -40%, and with -1 damage on the White Mage/MoL/Enchantress/Shyde/Paladin, but I recognize that's not a popular proposal and probably won't happen.

It seems like your main problem with old arcane is that there weren't enough arcane resistant units, correct?

More or less. While there are a lot of arcane-resistant units - humans, saurians, monsters, etc - in practice arcane isn't commonly countered. Loyalists are great arcane counters, but are rare enemies. Outlaws and saurians have good arcane resist and are common-ish enemies, but they often rely on high dodge, which is still countered by the MoL/Enchantress/etc.

How you are dealing with point #2 is frankly turning Orc/Saur/Human resistances parallel to eachother, resulting into flat-boring.
Your words... "I'd prefer for orcs and humans/saurians/etc to have the same arcane resist", heh :/

In other words, point #2 is not even a problem, my argument is similar to the one about Swordman vs Pikeman on The Balance Team channel on discord. Here a screenshot of what i mean, you will have to read it through to get to the point, but in short its about campaigns not having mirror matchups, its usually race "x" vs race "y", instead of race "x" vs race "x".

Basically, Humans with +20% arcane will counter other Humans with +20% Arcane. [i cannot give a very deep view on this since i don't play Age of Heros and isn't played much on MP, but it sure influence White Mage damage.]

Swordman vs Pikeman - Screenshot

however I disagree with the idea of increasing the orcs' resistance to arcane.

Worth noting - even in 1.16, arcane resistance were kinda random.

As far as I know there's never really been any clear lore behind 0%-10%-20% (besides guesses like "well maybe bears are more mundane than wolves"), or any reason why some races were picked to get 20% while others were picked to get 0%.

Exactly, 100% agree here Dalas, and here comes my weird controversial changes XD

- Saurians angurs and skirmishers should have the same arcane resistance. They are both saurians and neither knows arcane magic.
- Shadow mages should be the same as normal humans. Necromancers have +20%, so shadow mages should not be lower.

Augur: [1.18] Keep +10%
Skirmisher: [1.16] Revert +20%
Shadow Mage: [1.18] Keep +10%

Saurian Augur ~ "Saurians have some knowledge of what men call sorcery, but their practice of it reeks of augury and black magic. It is little understood, but rightly regarded with fear by those against whom it is used."

The idea behind Saurian Augur having +10% Arcane is based around their description, so the ignorance about this kind of Magic have a side effect, in this case weaking the spellcaster, much similar to how Dark Adept pay a "price" ... [striking the physical rather than the essence of the creature]

Dark Adept ~ "Hidden away in secret cults, or initiated into the dark orders of the underworld, the training which these fanatics must endure often drives them to exhaustion and enfeeblement."

... connecting with Shadow Mages which has a similar description to Dark Adept ...

Shadow Mage ~ "While their zealous study has left their bodies exhausted and enfeebled, they instead channel their energies into devastatingly accurate melee attacks."

... the idea is to share same weakness of Augurs to the Shadow Mages, and giving the opportunity for UMC creators to give a development of how Saurs got into contact with Magic {"Saurians have some knowledge of what men call sorcery"} to support this direction i suggest to change the Attack Naming of Shadow Mages ranged to "Curse" to fit into this dynamic, sharing the root of their Magic {+10% Arcane} but develop into different forms.
{Shadow Mage with Magical Arcane Melee and Saurs with Healing Magic} - [maybe they did sell some magic to the saurs XD what do you think guys?]

Tomorrow i will talk about Animals & Magical Animals, probably.

Ravens aren't that different from falcons, no reason for them to have lower arcane resistance.

White horses aren't really different from Bay/Great, and should have the same 20% arcane resistance, Black could be somewhat different, either alien or posessed, that could explain why are they more vulnerable than regular.

Bats are common beasts with no apparent connection to otherworldly stuff, so they don't have reasons to have different arcane resistance than other animals, let alone changing between levels, it should be 20% across the whole race and lines.

[Roge_Tebnelok]

- Saurians angurs and skirmishers should have the same arcane resistance. They are both saurians and neither knows arcane magic.
- Shadow mages should be the same as normal humans. Necromancers have +20%, so shadow mages should not be lower.

Augur: [1.18] Keep +10%
Skirmisher: [1.16] Revert +20%
Shadow Mage: [1.18] Keep +10%

Saurian Augur ~ "Saurians have some knowledge of what men call sorcery, but their practice of it reeks of augury and black magic. It is little understood, but rightly regarded with fear by those against whom it is used."

The idea behind Saurian Augur having +10% Arcane is based around their description, so the ignorance about this kind of Magic have a side effect, in this case weaking the spellcaster, much similar to how Dark Adept pay a "price" ... [striking the physical rather than the essence of the creature]

Dark Adept ~ "Hidden away in secret cults, or initiated into the dark orders of the underworld, the training which these fanatics must endure often drives them to exhaustion and enfeeblement."

... connecting with Shadow Mages which has a similar description to Dark Adept ...

Shadow Mage ~ "While their zealous study has left their bodies exhausted and enfeebled, they instead channel their energies into devastatingly accurate melee attacks."

... the idea is to share same weakness of Augurs to the Shadow Mages, and giving the opportunity for UMC creators to give a development of how Saurs got into contact with Magic {"Saurians have some knowledge of what men call sorcery"} to support this direction i suggest to change the Attack Naming of Shadow Mages ranged to "Curse" to fit into this dynamic, sharing the root of their Magic {+10% Arcane} but develop into different forms.
{Shadow Mage with Magical Arcane Melee and Saurs with Healing Magic} - [maybe they did sell some magic to the saurs XD what do you think guys?]

I think augur description refers to poor understanding on human mages' part, not on saurians themselves. And as casters, they can't understand arcane less than skirmishers or any human soldier, who have standard resistance just for being regular. And if darker magic doesn't reduce resistance of DA, why should augurs have less, from lore perspective?

As for shadow mages, Libery and Eastern Invasion use different descriptions, you refer to EI one, and because they have the same name, unit database always returns EI one, which is only one hero unit, in EI only ghosts and DA line have arcane damage among the enemies, and attacking the shadow mage with arcane is counterproductive and puts them in unnecessary risk, other humans are as vulnerable. In L, they are more numerous and vulnerable to attacks of Halstead's white mages, because they can't deal as much damage in retaliation, which makes them a better target. And they aren't really enfeebled and exhausted, they are just weak mages who compensate their lack of ranged power with better melee. This is their description in gamefiles of L: https://units.wesnoth.org/1.16/mainline ... 0Mage.html

"Years of violence and brutality to support the study of forbidden magical arts have turned the shadow mages into feared fighters. Now completely enthralled with power, they have been known to command small followings of henchmen. They are outmatched in direct magical combat with their magic-using peers, instead channeling their energies into devastating melee attacks. Despite their offensive power, the corruption in their souls has begun to adversely affect their health."

Also, in EI we already have mechanical reflection of their description, 35 hp and elusivefoot vulnerabilities, in L, not so much, but Dark Sorcerer with his prior enfeeblement has more hp, though they also outshine regular human mages in that regard. Reducing arcane esistance on top seems excessive, and connection to saurian magic is rather far-fetched, even as a campaign idea.

[matto]

I think augur description refers to poor understanding on human mages' part, not on saurians themselves.

Yeah, you are right after re-reading it, the wording makes sense now xD
By the way for me it is important to keep 20% Arcane on Saurian Skirmisher because it helps to counter Ghost, especially since it got buffed in 1.16 to 19 gold.

And if darker magic doesn't reduce resistance of DA, why should augurs have less, from lore perspective?

Even if my take is made up, Wesnoth "Racial" Magic of minor races (saurians, trolls, wose, merman) needs a story development of some sort or the Underdog Mages (Shadow Mage, Silver Mage), despite the game not really being about Magic, i remeber reading some article in Wesnoth Wiki of Dave saying that its more about Empire Army vs Army rather than Great Mages 1v9ing and controlling the battle alone, tho i believe it was more about gameplay rather than story, IMO its more fascinating having dark/light/fae/etc.. magic develop into different types of.

As for shadow mages, Libery and Eastern Invasion use different descriptions, you refer to EI one, and because they have the same name, unit database always returns EI one, which is only one hero unit, in EI only ghosts and DA line have arcane damage among the enemies, and attacking the shadow mage with arcane is counterproductive and puts them in unnecessary risk, other humans are as vulnerable.

This is their description in gamefiles of Liberty Shadow Mage:

"Years of violence and brutality to support the study of forbidden magical arts have turned the shadow mages into feared fighters. Now completely enthralled with power, they have been known to command small followings of henchmen. They are outmatched in direct magical combat with their magic-using peers, instead channeling their energies into devastating melee attacks. Despite their offensive power, the corruption in their souls has begun to adversely affect their health."

Yeah i remembered a different much better description in 1.12, backthen Corruption being such a powerful and interesting theme of (or branch of) "Dark Magic", thats why i don't consider DiD in top best mainline campaigns anymore, kinda lost its charm. Before you wouldn't be able to deal with the Corruption, the narrative pushed for a much stronger foreshadowing and mysterious vibe. [Now you just do a monologue with your shadow-clone XD] I played a bit of Dalas TDG, and he does a much better job with the Sylph Scenario, less yapping more content!

Also, in EI we already have mechanical reflection of their description, 35 hp and elusivefoot vulnerabilities, in L, not so much, but Dark Sorcerer with his prior enfeeblement has more hp, though they also outshine regular human mages in that regard.

In SP +10% Resistance are much more effective than in MP 1v1/2v2, since SP has common level ups (bigger damage), honestly an easy fix with some more HP for SP.

And since we are talking about 10% Res, i will adress the infamous Goblin 10% Arcane, i totally get the dislike of this one, there is no excuse here xD

Just straight up though of a way to make Goblin interesting versus Undeads, that would need an additional change to Goblin ranged-Pierce to a Torch Throw(ranged-fire 4/5dmg x 1 strike), again trying to add an additional counter to Ghost with the combination of this two. (Current counters being Archer or a funky Assassin/Wolf taking the kill)

Plus Goblin could play as a counter to HI (which has currently -10% Fire Res), helping for a rework of HI, anyway lets save this off-topic for the future.

[matto]

Ravens aren't that different from falcons, no reason for them to have lower arcane resistance.

White horses aren't really different from Bay/Great, and should have the same 20% arcane resistance, Black could be somewhat different, either alien or posessed, that could explain why are they more vulnerable than regular.

Bats are common beasts with no apparent connection to otherworldly stuff, so they don't have reasons to have different arcane resistance than other animals, let alone changing between levels, it should be 20% across the whole race and lines.

Icemonax and Frost Stoat are the product of adaptation to cold environment, their cold damage isn't really unnatural, and they live mostly in the Northlands, where frozen claws and fangs aren't something outside of the row, so they can count as usual animals and monsters.

I consider this five "SUPERNATURAL" {Frost Stoat ~ Dread Bat ~ White Horse ~ Dark Horse - Raven} most based off their description.
[I bet this will rise questions about plus/minus Arcane difference in Lore, and if it wont i want explain myself futher anyway this days]

Dread Bat ~ "gaining the ability to drain not merely the blood but the very life energy of their victims"

For the Dread Bat i went with an Increase of the Arcane Resistances to 20% compared to the 10% of lvl0-1 Bat, to represent the description.

White Horse ~ "But there exist a special breed, found only in the wild woods, that are White Horses. As if blessed by the faerie world, they have a grace and agility not found in their more common relatives"

Same of why Elves have -10% Arcane, because related to fea world. Here i am trying to push for eerie narrative, since the descriptions in general don't do affermations, it let the player wonder which is the truth, but i think the 9 mp is clearly pushing for that.

Black Horse ~ "The true nature of Black Horses is impossible to discern, but the fire in their eyes and the unnerving, unnatural sound of their calls suggest they are malevolent spirits."

Here is where i believe people are comming up with the evil vs good theme. (i like my morality spectre grey xD)

Roge_Tebnelok: "Black could be somewhat different, either alien or posessed, that could explain why are they more vulnerable than regular"

As i said before, i want to explain how i see negative/positive Arcane Resistances, right now its treated in a simple minded way, afflicting the numbers weirdly IMO.

Evil = minus arcane res
Good = plus arcane res

trasferimento.jpg (43.9 KiB) Viewed 3022 times

[Origar]

As a longtime veteran of this game who has played for close to 15 years, I have come to appreciate the "standardized" balancing of the default era and its units. I understand some minor changes taking place for consistency sake but I am strongly opposed to the 1.18 update's arcane changes and would like to see all changes reverted to the previous versions. In an example of a unit like the paladin, his "light magic" is shown through his arcane damage and resistance to it. His identity as such was completely crippled imo. I would defer to others opinions for other reasons why these changes should be reverted. My last bit of input for this topic is this:

These changes are very disruptive to a baseline that has been consistent for over 12+ years and impact not just the default era but any and all eras that have tried to do their balancing based on the default era as a reference, which is most of them I'd say.

I would also like to add that I am open to seeing some arcane resistances shift, I just disagree with the way that its currently been done.

[Yomar]

Yes, 1.16 was more balaced, the XP chamges are kinda ok.
I think Arcane resistances are ok, at most maybe some minor changes should be done.
Also some buffs in this version are crazy, like the Trapper one or the ones given to various high level Elves.