I'm tossing this here for the moment rather than announcements because it's still a work in progress and I anticipate a certain amount of discussion. How jackassed this discussion becomes probably will determine if I repeat this experiment soon.

I've been doing some conjurer tweaking tonight, which will be showing up in a crash/reboot near you sometime soon. Here's the gist of it:

1) Familiars. The familiars that should be out and with the conjurer in dangerous situations have been improved slightly more with respect to how much of a beating they can take. Saves against faerie dragon faeriefog and imp impcurse are a little harder than they used to be. I'm toying with the idea of letting familiars in the room with their master share protective spells cast upon him for free, but I don't know that this is all that necessary.

2) Elementals. A new elem command available to all four kinds of elementals, noarea, will let you tell your elemental that you don't want it using its area attack spell-like ability anymore. This is not a toggle (once you tell it noarea, it's done for the life of the elemental), and it won't execute other special attacks in the place of the earthquakes it's not doing, etc. This is another option for conjurers; you certainly don't need to take it if you don't think this is a good option.

I want to evaluate the balance effects of elementals not 100% predictably getting themselves killed by area'ing in certain situations before I consider taking this any further, and I've learned the hard way it's easier to give a little and then a little more later than to give a lot and need to take some of it back later.

3) Morosa demons. Their chain lightning should be a little less obnoxious.

4) Challegha demons. These demons, if pleased with their masters, will be less (note: that's 'less', not 'not') inclined to attack their master or his allies if they are wounded.



That's where it sits right now. Also on my list and more likely to be a more gradual project is tweaking devil AI. The spells they cast won't likely change; their strategy for picking them likely will, making them more effective in some situations and perhaps less in others (nothing's perfect, and we've all watched an archon do something dumb rather than save a conjurer's life on occasion). As one particular example, I don't feel that devils do enough for an orderly neutral conjurer, for whom binding a devil should be one of his top choices, all things being equal (which they never are, but let's pretend.)

Other changes of grander scope, such as splitting angels to work and be chosen like demons, are beyond the time I intend to divert from a somewhat bigger project right now.

are conjurer tweaks still being looked at? I'm having trouble keeping some demons happy in situations that are hurting my CON.

-rulanit

No, I'm pretty much done and satisfied and on to something else.

Would it be overpowered to allow air elementals to drag conjie high in the air where air shifters and druids only fly? Maybe w/o other servitors so conjie would suck in fighting in the air.

I like alot of the new tweaks to conjies, how bout some Flavored text lovin?

-r

Ok I havent played conjies in a while but I have read logs and kept up on the forum reading. So here is what I am getting from evil conjies.. its not that they are bad its just that they are not very user friendly. Evil conjies played by competant characters have been devastating in the past and its the mediocre and newbie people that suffer the most. So here go a couple ideas that I think would work.

First of all the difference in demons, I know we tinkered with challegha's a lot and they turned out pretty good. My take on evil conjurers is that perhaps we fall into the bigger better system that goodies have going for them. More mana = more power and better protection healing, better offense on angels etc etc. Other than the croaker, Ive seen very little difference between the other three. Got challegha that is almost an invoker demon. So would it take too much away from the other classes if the other demons were class specific? A demon that did warrior stuff (maybe even have it come up with weapons and a random spec, demon that did necro stuff?

As for devils, I like devils I think the quick fix to devils would be for them to cast more than one defensive spell on you. Like a devil that will cast aura, another casts aura and shield, and then lesser ice casts shield and barrier. For most players mostly you will still want to carry your own wands because sometimes you just cant afford to wait for the devil to cast on you but it makes conjies a little more forgiving to the newbies.
Another way to go is to perhaps let a conjurer gain inherent spells from having a devil under control. Each devil grants maybe one or two spells. If evil conjies are supposed to be total beasties on offense this would make sense. The game balance issues can be easily tackled by the spells or skills you guys decide to assign to each devil. Again this follows the devil/demon for every season thing cause hey maybe you want the cool skill on the abishai but now you have to give up the barrier shield you'd get from the lesser ice. Just a few ideas feel free to shoot them down.

Whatcha think neppy?

Parv

The demons have a pretty varied spell/skill selection now, in my opinion. Granted, you'll only see or understand some of the abilities situationally. Demon X could cast stoneshatter (not a real example) on 50,000 white pawns but you'll never really see anything happening. Along those lines I think a couple of the demon abilities only really shine against PCs or in certain other situations.

The demons all having differing attacking and happiness/unhappiness rules mixes them up a bit, too, and in theory should make the choice more complicated.

Other than that, I think conjurers are sitting pretty close to what I think they should be after this last set of changes, or closer enough that it'll take time to figure out where they're too weak or too strong again.

Please read through the whole post. There is a whole hodgepodge of ideas here that I think might help the class, and I'd like them all to be considered.


I was thinking about conjurers, and one glaring problem became evident in regards to ones who use demons and devils: the hitpoint dilemma. Anyone who has played a conjurer knows that they have absolute ASS for hp (I recall having just over 300 natural hp at level 35 with my first). Now this is a pain in the ass to begin with, but when you consider that your demon or devil will jump you if you become too injured, it means that your max "workable" hp is actually less...so at best you have 200hp to work with at level 35 before you have a chance of your servitor deciding to eat your face. Even with every protection I can think of, that blows.

So, how could this be fixed? How about making a class-wide variable prime stat for conjurers? It makes sense that good conjurers would want to be charismatic, because they don't want to truly exert their will over angels and archons (although this is debatable when you really think about what "lightbind" does). When it comes to someone who is working with demons and devils, I really don't see why they'd want to be charismatic; they would want to completely dominate their servitors. Also, the rigors of this particular school of magic, such as the constant risk of getting your ass beaten, training with axes, use of shields, etc., seem to indicate that conjurers should be tough son's of bitches, as mages go, and should have more hp than other mages...maybe more along the lines of shamans. The class-wide variable stat would work as follows: Good conjurers would have a choice between charisma or intelligence as the prime stat, evil conjurers would choose between intelligence and constitution, and neutral conjurers could choose any of the three. Furthermore, charisma would no longer be a factor in dealing with evil servitors, or at least less of one. Again, conjurers, on the whole, should receive greater hp gains...most dramatically towards evil conjurers who choose constitution as their prime stat.

Now, to reduce some of the fatal uncertainty that this class currently has, I want to toss out an idea to alter lightbind, darkbind, and bind elemental. How about making a "most successful" level of casting for this spell? What I mean is that if you hit this "sweet spot" when attempting a binding, the chance of your servitor turning on you (for ANY reason) is removed. The rationale is that the spell was successful enough that the conjurer managed to exert total control over the servitor in question. Now, when this happens a special message would be added to the spell's normal echo:


c darkbind demon
You bind a croaking challegha demon to your servitude!
A blank expression covers a croaking challegha demon's face as you take complete control over it.


Of course, if the conjurer attacks the servitor in any way, shape, or form would nullify that benefit. Hell, if this seems to strong and you guys like it, but want to dumb it down, make that effect dispellable.

Another idea I had is for certain familiars (specifically the most intelligent of each alignment) to gain a new ability called "sustain circle". This togglable ability would allow the familiar to add power to a conjurer's circle of protection, no matter the type. Echoes would go off every now and then as it works to sustain the magic, and there would be a series of warning signs as the circle crumbles. The danger is that your familiar is going to be sitting with you, and will be lagged if attacked or otherwise distracted from its chore.


So anyways, those are just some things I thought of. Let me know what you all think.

-Mek

I like the lightbind thing. I always had tp explain it by saying that 'they just are intelligent enough to understand why we need them'. But angels and archons being stupid? Its not too believable. Especially with the echoes like 'in a blinding flash, an angel appears, eager to defend the light'.

I suggest making it a 'persuade' deal. And as does happen in bargins with other-planar beings, misunderstandings can occur and they might just strike out angrily. It would seriously help good conjurer RP if the angel kneeled before the conjurer and wilfully offered its help if the conjurer ties it to this plane. Binding then becomes 'holding their existance here' instead of 'enslave'. Its a purely cosmetic change that would be awesome.

Demons, likewise, should be dark and nasty. A complete control could still be lost, but I agree in thinking that them turning on a weakened conjurer should not be only because they're hurt. I think such risks should appear only towards the end of a binding spell when you've had time to either please or displease your demon buddy. I'm sure the Imms will start saying its for gameplay, but I think its a lot more RPish and likely. Since we're re-balancing the class, lets give it that RP face lift we'd love at the same time.

I am more than willing to roll up a conjurer after I'm done playing what I like right now, but proving this stuff and getting changes done is a long process. It might have to wait until I think up a fun RP angle for it (which can take weeks if I'm not inspired). I would encourage others to try conjurers though, as level-headed feedback would be a great help to Tiara sporting nonces like Nep.

However...

I'm not so sure about the 'asses for hp' thing. I think too many people just use an axe and don't parry for crap. They have the same defensive potential as Anti-paladins (minus haste, ahem), a bit less HP but have servitors that will help them tank more often than not. Evil conjurers get the added offense because goodies tend to focus more on defense. The 'turning' thing was part of that sacrifice for pure nastiness and goodies have their own version (which is nastier because they lose the defense they were using at the time). I don't think a conjurer will have too many problems at hero with wands and good gear. At lower levels, because their offensive capabilities are so great, they need that crappy defensive rating. It keeps things in balance at the moment.

Hope this helps.

Yhorian.

Why the hell do demons portal around like all-powerful beings when they chase you anyway?

When they turn on you, make it so they walk normally.

They're your only offensive/defensive output, so when they turn its hard to fight back. If you were able to word/teleport away, that'd be a huge improvement. I'm betting many would still die from the experiance. If your worried about it making conjuring/binding too easy, put a lag on them breaking circles and devouring you. Say, 3 rounds(ish) if your they break your concentration on a circle and jump for you to recover.

The fact you can't summon another for ages is already a big payment. Since they're aggro, its usually hard to re-bind them. (he he, though I have tricks for this) And if it was a jump on a weakened conjurer I'm betting the conjurer was fighting something else. Having a demon turn on you, while something else is hurting you, is almost a given death sentance. Being able to word away would save you from death but still leave you crippled/defenseless.

Assides from this grand 'conjurations no longer effin' gate to you' idea, I'd like to hear the reasoning for the fact they do right now. To hard to code otherwise?

Thanks.

Yhorian.

Why the hell do demons portal around like all-powerful beings when they chase you anyway?

They don't walk to you from the Abyss, you know.

valguarnera@carrionfields.com

And had no choice. Its not as if the conjure spell is 'make them portal here, instead of portaling in circles about their stripper pole'

If you think about my 'binding is tying your servitor to this plane' angle on re-vamping the way we think of bindings... it would also play well into the old 'he summoned an unbound thingy, that then was left sitting about, and attacked me.' Like when angels used to be summoned and left at guardians in raids, waiting for an area effect or something they were aggro to.

If a proper binding wasn't done in time, they'd simply be forced back to their plane of existance. It also explains why servitors leave after a certain time (weak bindings, on an angel who would love to stay and help the light) and why our plane isn't full of these things normally. I know things like the Talshidar are a biggy but something about them holding themselves here would also explain why conjurers don't walk about binding demons already here. Whew, hope I made that one clear.

For some odd reason, I just got really passionate about re-structuring the way we think about conjurers. Think we could have it sorted before we rebalance them? I really want them to have tasty RP angles that people can understand and are much clearer in the helpfiles. There's some serious holes in the conjurer 'religion' that I think need clarification to the playerbase before we make assumptions.

If you like, mail me. I can toss out a slew of ideas over time and refine this. I swear I've memorised every conjurer-based tome and chart I've ever found (from the planar charts to rants on summoning princely air elementals! Silly Scions) and though I know you guys know better, I figure a view from below might help.

In true Deva style, end rant.

Yhorian.

>I was thinking about conjurers, and one glaring problem became
>evident in regards to ones who use demons and devils: the
>hitpoint dilemma. Anyone who has played a conjurer knows that
>they have absolute ASS for hp (I recall having just over 300
>natural hp at level 35 with my first).

Well, they've got "mage hp", yeah. Same as the other mages, con for con.

>Now this is a pain in
>the ass to begin with, but when you consider that your demon
>or devil will jump you if you become too injured, it means
>that your max "workable" hp is actually less...so at best you
>have 200hp to work with at level 35 before you have a chance
>of your servitor deciding to eat your face. Even with every
>protection I can think of, that blows.

I think your assumptions are semi-outdated here.

Some (not all) devils can potentially jump you if you're very wounded and they're somewhat unhappy. I haven't actually seen this happen in a very long time.

As far as I know, only one kind of demon will jump on you for being beat up. Its jumping tendencies now (as of the start of this thread or thereabouts) are reduced/eliminated by its happiness. So basically you'd have to either not use that kind of demon or be careful around it if you can't make it happy.

>So, how could this be fixed? How about making a class-wide
>variable prime stat for conjurers? It makes sense that good
>conjurers would want to be charismatic, because they don't
>want to truly exert their will over angels and archons
> although this is debatable when you really think about what
>"lightbind" does). When it comes to someone who is working
>with demons and devils, I really don't see why they'd want to
>be charismatic; they would want to completely dominate their
>servitors. Also, the rigors of this particular school of
>magic, such as the constant risk of getting your ass beaten,
>training with axes, use of shields, etc., seem to indicate
>that conjurers should be tough son's of bitches, as mages go,
>and should have more hp than other mages...maybe more along
>the lines of shamans. The class-wide variable stat would work
>as follows: Good conjurers would have a choice between
>charisma or intelligence as the prime stat, evil conjurers
>would choose between intelligence and constitution, and
>neutral conjurers could choose any of the three. Furthermore,
>charisma would no longer be a factor in dealing with evil
>servitors, or at least less of one. Again, conjurers, on the
>whole, should receive greater hp gains...most dramatically
>towards evil conjurers who choose constitution as their prime
>stat.

My thoughts amount to: Even if I considered allowing conjurers pick their prime stat, I wouldn't be willing to devalue charisma. Otherwise, you're just letting evil conjurers gear for one less stat and giving them more hit points, and I honestly don't think they need it.

>Now, to reduce some of the fatal uncertainty that this class
>currently has, I want to toss out an idea to alter lightbind,
>darkbind, and bind elemental. How about making a "most
>successful" level of casting for this spell? What I mean is
>that if you hit this "sweet spot" when attempting a binding,
>the chance of your servitor turning on you (for ANY reason) is
>removed. The rationale is that the spell was successful enough
>that the conjurer managed to exert total control over the
>servitor in question. Now, when this happens a special message
>would be added to the spell's normal echo:

Without going to the step of making a game balance judgement here, stylistically I don't like this. If you want to play a character with 'dumb' mobs who do what you say, there's necromancer, druid, Tribunal, mercenaries, etc. The intelligence and degree of free will inherent in conjurers is much of what makes the class unique, and it's both one of the strongest benefits and one of the greatest weaknesses of the class. When a pair of axe warriors and a pebble-happy invoker tool up on your archon-binding conjurer and start lagging him like crazy, you're pretty glad that it can make up its own mind to heal you without needing orders or you to not be permalagged to be useful. It's pretty nice that your demon will jump on that paladin and start bashing him while you're blind and deafened. With that strength of smart mobs comes its downsides.

However, I'd give a neutral conjie a modifier so that the effect is not nearly as pronounced.

For example, a good aligned conjie that called 5 evil servitors becomes neutral (with corresponding penalties). I think this would stop almost every good aligned conjie being happy to call nightgaunts. Sure, a good conjie can rp calling nightgaunts, but without cabal restrictions, over 90% of good conjies choose this rp. Does that make sense? Not to me.

A neutral conjie, however, can call one evil servitor every 200 game hours (say) without it counting towards their "evilness" (and a timer goes in their effects to let them know when they last called one so they don't accidentally mess up). Anything in excess of this counts towards their evilness quotient.

I'd also make smoke-mephits neutral in alignment. I mean, they are basically weak para-elementals, are they not?

Finally, I'd make it (and this is probably even more contentious than the above), that if you want a chance to get a familiar that flies, you can't call your first familiar until hero. This to act against those that delete upon finding they don't have raven and against those that sit at 40 using their raven to scout in order to gaunt. Gaunts are already extremely strong against specific classes, and succumb is no real option at all if there is a gang waiting for the gaunted guy.

>For example, a good aligned conjie that called 5 evil
>servitors becomes neutral (with corresponding penalties). I
>think this would stop almost every good aligned conjie being
>happy to call nightgaunts. Sure, a good conjie can rp calling
>nightgaunts, but without cabal restrictions, over 90% of good
>conjies choose this rp. Does that make sense? Not to me.

FYI, I've made conjurers neutral/evil for this before.

I definitely don't want to discourage neutral conjurers from making use of demons and devils.

I can see a few angles where it would be more appropriate for a good-aligned conjurer to conjure/bind demons and devils than angels and archons. This isn't really a power combination -- while I think a good generally can get more functional use out of a demon/devil than an evil can out of angel/archon, your servitors are still going to be contentious and difficult enough that I can't easily imagine choosing to play that way for powergamey reasons.

Actually I see it as kind of a cool idea to play a goodie that uses only demons and devils.

If you are afraid of goodie gaunts I am scared for your wellbeing. I have never seen a very strong one.

You just have to know the classes to target.

But I summoned strong nightgaunts fairly often, and it is a low risk tactic that can just be repeated until it works.

APs, for example, are extremely vulnerable to gaunts. My own have had to go to stupid lengths to deal with them, and I killed several of the stronger (sometimes distended) aps with them back in the day. It's how I first got the very nice golden ring.

Why don't we just do it this way, make a goodie nightgaunt, and then make a whole section of spells for a ####ing nuetral char, elementals, then give him something equilavent to demons/angels and devil/archons. This going evil because you bind evil creatures too often is the lamest thing I've ever heard. If you ask me, why would a good aligned creature want to bind another good aligned creature into, SERVITUDE. *roll*

I also think that align based kinda shoots the class in the foot. Take away align base from the equation, lick the problem of Demon's that are ####ing bound to you, (This boggles me), attacking and kill you, and you might just see more conjurers on the prowl.

-Not even currently playing a conjurer, angry at the world steve-

lol, sorry if that came off raucious.

They could just make nightgaunts neutral.

That way there would be no RP conflict, at all. Unless you're saying that nightgaunts make good-aligned conjurers overpowered?

...is if nightgaunts are so evil, why doesn't it say so in the helpfile? It only says they're a "servitor race". Not a, say, "EVIL servitor race" ....Unless anything with "night" in it's name or title is inherently evil...

Because you can see that the first time you conjure one and the helpfiles aren't meant to spell out EVERYthing for you.

It does say they're capricious expert abductors. I don't know if that spells non-evil to me.

So you are meaning to say that a Chaotic Good Maran Binder would not fall into this catagory? I doubt just because they are capricious expert abductors then that makes them evil.

A grabby thing that hammers down on someone, paralyzes them, jiggles them seriously on a rapid flight to some far off place then says

'Hey, sorry. These guys really wanted to meet you. Here, let me help you up!'

There are two paladins, a maran thief and a conjurer here.

You are DEAD!!

Lets hope there is such a plane of really nice abductors out there.

I vote we just let goodies have the edge on 'locating' while the evils have the edge on 'destroying'. I always though gaunts were a chase thing anyhow.

It could be because the concept (and name) of nightgaunts was taken from the HP Lovecraft/Cthulhu mythos, and a servitor race there pretty much means evil, at least as far as a human being is concerned. At least they don't drop you off in the Vale of Pnath in CF...

I think they make them a little overpowered. However, if there was a "good" equivalent to a nightgaunt, I'd be ok about it.

For starters, the protection spell would offer evils some protection from them, but mainly because, as you've worked out, it is the rp side of things that really ticks me off.

I'm pretty sick of 90%+ of good conjies not being willing to conjure demons or devils but being happy to conjure nightgaunts.

I mean.. for both neutrals and goodies I could never get a nightgaunt to bring anyone EVER unless the person wanted to be. Now the HUNT... that is overpowered.

First time I did it it cost me a huge amount of gold at a healer I'd summoned, since I expected to be gaunted (20 gold, but a fire ap could probably get away with about 5-10 gold).

Normally, ap's can't get away from a gaunt without going to a healer or changing continents, once the gaunt is on them.

Orcs also can be captured by goodie gaunts much of the time.

I don't think my gaunts ever failed to bring back an ap that was on his own, and some of these aps were ubercharged and stacked with gear.

AP's don't dodge at all, plus they need the 'tick' to recover. With Nightgaunts dishing out the damage, I don't see many APs surviving. Forget about submission too. Somehow I would like to see good conjies with limited nightgaunt abilities and also a higher chance of these creatures turning on them.

I have played four hero ranged conjurers so I will throw in my few cents.

Demons,

I would use the harmentia and mors-gravis about 50:50.
The harmentia is very useful for fighting certain kinds of mobs, mors is for rest of the time.

I would not use the morosa even if the chain was reduced. Any hp loss from my demon is unacceptable. I would also not use the chally, why would you pick a demon that could turn? It just aint going to happen.

Devils,

I don’t know why people complain, devils are decent, it is no excuse to say that fights are too short, you should bring your own resistances to the fight. Conjurers need longer fights. I would actually like to see barrier and aura scrapped from devils and replaced with something that can complement your existing barrier and aura wands. And I would however like to see the % chance of top devil vs weak devil improved. The black abashi is virtually useless. In contrast the weak archon is still decent.

Pk balance,

I consider evil conjurers to be balanced in terms of pking. They simply require a bit more skill to pull off, but are great if you do it.

Mob deaths,

This is the annoying part. Any other mage I can place many trains in to hp, but conjurers you need to save for con. The only way to completely avoid mob deaths is to overbind all the time which is not feasible. The second problem is the window of flee and return is very small. To early and the mob re-attacks, too late and your mobs leave. It is very easy to gain a mob death if you get a little lazy or just take a very bad round. This is why the harmentia is good, but it’s limited to align, I would like to see another demon attack evil mobs.

Regen,

My previous conjurers relied on the twilight and the troll which made playing a conjurer very enjoyable. Now the easy access slow wand makes conjurers acceptable. The moment that wand is not in the game, conjurers are not feasible. I am not sure that the feasibility of a class should rely totally on the presence of 1 item.

Familiars,

Evil Conjurer needs the raven, I will only play a conjurer that has the raven. Nightgaunt is a big part of the evil conjurers pking style and you need the raven to rule out cabal presence. I would like to try other familiars but the only way it will be worth it is if nightgaunt is changed.

Nightgaunt,

This is well balanced and I like the succumb option. However, to fix the problem above, I’d like either cabals/across continent not to protect them. I think only under water and explore areas should have protection.

Clairvoyance/clairaud

That is good that you have made this easier. This was certain death to the solo evil conjurer.

Elementals

Cheers to making elementals better for levelling.

Overall

I think evil conjurers are decent characters, but not for the beginners. I also think a lot of pro’s don’t play conjurers because they are limited. Scarabaeus is brilliant at coming up with ideas, but lacks the fighting mechanics. By this I mean conjurers have limited choices in fights, missile, lash, murder, dispel, zap. However, all the other chars have many choices so I think it is fine to have this unique class. Just pointing out a reason why some people don’t play them.

Curious, where did this new spunky nepenthe come from? More time now or a more conscious effort to get involved? Either way. Rock on.


Cheers.
Jhyrb.

With the somewhat more limited numbers, getting your familiar at like rank 12 or 13 would be a fantastic boon to your solo ranking ability.

Right now, at least to me Angels seem to generic while demons have a much wider tactical use. So, I am just going to toss out some ideas to either be shot down or mabey taken into consideration. Most of these ideas are driven from their descriptions, to give you an idea for what I am coming up with. Just trying to break this down a bit and mabey get some more loving on the goodie side of the conjurations(And make something other than Archons worth it!)

Winged Angel
Desc: Beautiful beyond description the features of this holy being are sublime even in their ferocity. White, feathered wings rise in gentle arcs from its back and luminous white robes hang from its larger-than-human form. Bearing a sword of light in one hand and a glittering shield at its side, this warrior of the Light is prepared to destroy any that might oppose it.
Attack type: Slice
Skills: Rescue, Shield Block, Shield Mastery, mabey other Shield Dedicate moves
Spells: Protection(self), Wrath, Crusade, Cause Wounds

Radiant Angel
Desc: Lovely and deadly, the delicate features of this heavenly being are nearly non-discernable in the brilliance of its holy aura. Feathered wings drift behind it as if pulled by celestial breezes unfelt by the Material Realms.
Attack Type: Piercing(In room desc)
Skills: Rescue
Bonus: (Using its unearthly beauty personifies itself as more of a bard in my mind)
Charismatic Prelude, Battaglia, Cacophonous Clamor, Piercing Dissonance(The draw back being like Morosa’s chain lightning.), other bard songs if the conjurer of a high level.

Terrible Angel
Desc: Encircled in a blaze of white fire, this heavenly host serves as the wrath of the Light. Blinding motes of brilliance drift around its arc of piercing light like radiant bubbles floating in the dark sea of the Material Realms.
Attack Type: Wrath, Heavenly Blast
Skills: Rescue
Spells: Curse, Blind, Pillar of the Heavens, Wrath, Fireball, Flamestrike, Turn Undead, Dispell Magic

Lesser Archangel
Desc: (Did not get a chance with my last big categorizing conjie project to get this one.)
Attack Type: Wrath
Skills: Rescue, Two hand Dedicate skills
Spells: Protection, Wrath, Crusade, Heal(Self Only, not conjurer), Holy Word(Rarely Used), Damnation, Demonfire


I know alot of this stuff is drawn from the classes of Paladins, Shamans, Invokers, and Bards, but I did that for ease of coding as well as to give some veriation in personality of the different angels, where as now there is none.

Let me know what you think.

Only people who have spent a decent amount of time playing with demons since the change that allowed conjurers to pick their type of demon responding to this one, please.

Given the changes already made or described elsewhere in this thread, which of the four demon types would you be least likely to use? Is there one kind of the four that seems so bad to you that there doesn't seem to be a situation in which it'd outshine the others? If so, please explain why.

Thank you.

Although you've helped it a bit with the chain lightning things, it always seemed to have the lowest health.

Generally, demons are better tankers than the conjurers. And a Morosa would always fall fast in any fight. I got the feeling its defenses weren't too hot and even then thats its health wasn't either.

This may well be just because it would zap itself silly with chainlightning, but I'm not so sure when I think about it. Can't say I'm unbiased.


Yhorian.

Morosa for the reason mentioned in the post below. The chain lightning would always seem to get themselves into far to much trouble with other mobs in the room, for the amount of damage its chain lightning often did.

The draw back for Mors Gravis makes it next to useless unless you are gaunting goodies. For ranking, if not killing evil or neutral mobs, it gets itself killed quick by lashing out all goodies nearby(which though, when used properly can be devestating).

>Morosa for the reason mentioned in the post below. The chain
>lightning would always seem to get themselves into far to much
>trouble with other mobs in the room, for the amount of damage
>its chain lightning often did.

But I done said consider the changes announced elsewhere in this thread.

I'd go with the Mors Gravis demon the least likely. Against gnomes and svirfs, its physical attack is nice, but against those, the mental attacks of the demon are just not worth it. I'd perfer to see the demon be given a different set of special attacks, and change one of the other demons to more mental. Maybe switch the Mors Gravis demon to a more physical role with bashs and such (It is a lumbering demon) and switch the Morosa demon in a more mage based class using those powers from it. On a different note, I'd rather see the Harmentia demon switched to a warrior specs demon, that comes with low level weapons, but if it slays foes with better weapons, it will pick them up and wield those instead. So you can custom its attack and weapons to the needs. Change it too so when its killed the weapons vanish instead of being in the corpse.

nt

Here's just a rundown of my likes and dislikes for the various demons.

Mors-gravis - Like blunt attack, don't like that its bashes almost always missed and mental knife alone seemed somewhat weak compared to other demons.

Harmentia - Didn't like that it did fireball all the time. It was otherwise pretty good. Somewhat liked that it was very aggressive and didn't attack you when you got low in health. Didn't land enough hits on warrior types, they seemed to tank it too well for my tastes. Its bashes always missed too.

Morosa - With the changes I'd use this more. Gore never really seemed to lag unfortunately. I'd have to play with this more now because before with the chained lightning I literally almost never used it so this one I don't know a ton about.

Challegha - Should remove or lower its auto-attacking ability even more mostly to a lower health (15% or lower). As an evil conjurer, you have enough to worry about. This was my favorite demon except I was almost never able to safely use it. The problem for me was that even though you could choose 4 demons, I always picked harmentia or mors-gravis because the other ones gave me too many mob deaths or would attack me while my enemies were attacking me and kill me off. Harmentia has some other restrictions so basically I wound up using mors-gravis a lot which, compared to the other demons, is sort of crappy. I can understand having limited selection, but compared to an angel mors-gravis just doesn't cut it.

Devils - Make them barrier more, I don't think that'd be unfair considering they're relatively bad in PK compared to demons. They don't enter into melee meaning you're tanking and they don't heal you. Barrier doesn't seem overpowered in light of that. Demons at least will tank for you so if you use a hit and run and hide-behind-the-demon they just always and unequivocably seemed like a much, much better choice than devils. Problem with evil conjies compared to good is the requirement (not suggestion) of using barrier. You tank like crap and you can't afford to lose health due to how servitors pounce on you. So basically you're left with the option of using demons to at least keep foes off of you and on them. That's how I played an evil conjie and it was successful but I just felt like 3/4 of the class left me open to too many ways of getting screwed.

I've always felt that the drawbacks of conjurers (evil in particular), regarding your own abilities causing your death, suck. Sure, from a pure RP standpoint it makes complete sense that powerful extraplanar beings would get pissed off and beat your ass, but mechanics/fun-wise it blows. I've played several evil and neutral conjurers, and I always felt like I couldn't depend on my own abilities to do ANYTHING. If the same level of uncertainty that conjurers have was applied to other classes, here are some possible outcomes:


As an Anti-Paladin:
(1000hp 800m 750mv) cleave mayesha
You attempt to cleave Mayesha in half, but miss entirely!
Your axe swings wildly out of control and you decapitate yourself!
You have been KILLED!!

As an Assassin:
(750hp 350m 630mv) assassinate sev

(750hp 350m 630mv)
You creep up behind Sevarecan with your dagger held tightly in hand,
but just before you reach him you trip over a rock and fall to the ground!
A sudden pain erupts in your chest as you accidentally drive your own dagger into your heart!
Oops!
You have been KILLED!!

As a Druid:
(825hp 800m 700mv) call of the wild
You call upon the wilds for aid!
Enraged by your presence in their domain, a pack of angry wolves breaks through the surrounding foliage to feast upon you!

(825hp 800m 700mv)
A pack of angry wolves' bite MANGLES you!
A pack of angry wolves' bite MASSACRES you!
A pack of angry wolves' bite MANGLES you!
A pack of angry wolves' bite MANGLES you!

(585hp 800m 700mv) flee
flee
flee
flee

(585hp 800m 700mv) flee
A pack of angry wolves' bite MANGLES you!
A pack of angry wolves' bite MASSACRES you!
A pack of angry wolves' bite MASSACRES you!
A pack of angry wolves' bite MASSACRES you!


As a Necromancer
(700hp 1025m 700mv) c 'power word kill' velkurah

(700hp 825m 700mv)
You point a finger at Velkurah and say 'Die.'
Velkurah's will to live is too strong, and the negative energy of your spell disperses through you!
You feel a sudden, intense stabbing pain as your mind is vaporized.
You have been KILLED!!


See, it just seems like this game offers enough of a challenge without making those challenges come from your own class ability set. Does anyone else feel the same way?

The only option I can see for how it'd be fun would be if you were straight up better than everyone who didn't have any downsides. If that was the case, evil conjurers would be considered overpowered and everyone would be playing them and everyone else would be whining. So basically, you can't have a class that is *as balanced* as every other class but then add in a bunch of ways to let you eat a mob death.

Its just not feasible. People will just play warriors, have as much firepower and versatility at the caveat that they don't get some of the perks but also don't eat stupid deaths. Sorta like why not many people play orcs. Sure, you get some unique stuff, but does it outweigh the suckiness of dying in some stupid way and having people loot you and catch XP loss too?

asdf

Perhaps instead of it turning & attacking a hurt conjurer instantly, it turns aggressive to the binder, or whoever is hurt, and will wear down the bind... like an aggressive pre-boundd demon does to a circle... while the injured person is still injured enough to attract the demon's ire & still in the room. Eventually the bind will be broken and the demon will attack whoever, but it gives the conjurer some time to throw up a circle and try to dismiss the thing... or for the group member to get the hell out of dodge.

So basic example:

Joe Conjurer's group:

Joe 100% hp
Warrior 20% hp
Thief 100% hp


demon in the room does the following

A croaking challegha demon fights against your mind control in an attempt to kill Warrior!

A croaking challegha demon fights against your mind control in an attempt to kill Warrior!

A croaking challegha demon fights against your mind control in an attempt to kill Warrior!

Warrior leaves west.

Warrior comes back healed, but conjurer doesn't dismiss the demon.

10 ticks later (about 15 ticks before the bind would usually wear off) the demon becomes unbound and attacks warrior.

----

Now about demon choices,

I would use Mors-Gravis a lot simply because it is the safest demon & Harmentia.

I wouldn't use the morosa unless I was alone & the damage from the chain lightning to me is next to nill.

I wouldn't use challegha at all unless something like that scheme I wrote above was put in, and then I would still use it fairly sparingly.

I played Jhyrdaer recently. I also played a hero goodie conjurer 3 years ago named Paerthin or something like that.

Coming to a crash/reboot near you soon:

1) Demons and angels are slightly less dumb in picking actions. They won't tend to keep trying to blind someone who's already blind, for example.

2) Started tweaking devil AI also; this is still far, far, far from done. In particular, they'll do a lot more for conjurers that aren't evil. If you're an orderly neutral conjurer, a devil might be a really good choice once these changes go live. If you're an evil conjurer, not too much has changed here.

3) Devils will be able to deal with groups more effectively. If you're of the "I can't beat one person with a devil, how am I going to handle three?" school of thought/experience, you probably still want to avoid that. I wouldn't say devils have been made good for fighting a group, just less bad.

4) Dimensional hunters (psychic vampire, lost soul, dimensional shambler, etc.) have been adjusted to punish non-archon/fire elemental servitor choices less severely. I'll warn you right now that if this turns out to make them too easy to deal with in the general case (unlikely, but possible) they'll be tweaked back up.

5) Homonculous made marginally better. Yay, homonculous.

I'm probably forgetting something, but I think that's about it. Some of the infrastructure for the above is going to be semi-recycled into building some bad-ass quest skills for a handful of non-conjurer classes. After that I may try to improve devil AI some more.

nt

Some of the infrastructure for the above is going to be semi-recycled into building some bad-ass quest skills for a handful of non-conjurer classes.

Wow, that sounds exciting. Care to give us a little more info on this or any other large projects you might be working on?

Splntrd

Carmack has a public .plan file; why not nepenthe?

I'm more than a little tempted to paste a log snippet, but it'll be more fun when you're surprised. BoltThrower always used to say it is, anyway!

A little bit of this fun has already been live in the game for a little while, though I haven't personally seen it used yet.

There are some big projects in the works. Also surpriseful!

Vague? Oh yeah, I've still got it, baby!

Familiars will awake on their own, even after told to sleep. You also don't see them wake up when looking through their eyes, when they do it on their own.

I've always had a hard time justifying as a good conjurer binding something to my will. Could we change it so that good conjurers ASK their pets to follow them?

All the changes sound great. I like the strengthening of the familairs especially.

As for the change concerning the elementals I think it would be more elegant if this option has to be used when conjuring or binding the elemental. (This could be interpreted tht it is bound in a particular way or perhaps a particular kind of elemental is conjured. The idea that I can order it not to use it skills, but that this decision can not be reversed seems harder to interpreet.)
Having to specify the option when conjuring or binding could also make future rebalancing easier as adding the option could affect the strength of the elemental or probability of failure.

But the above is just a minor comment. Good work.

I think a whole heck of a lot could be improved with the archon and devil AI. And most of it's pretty obvious.

For archons, move non-essential spells like bless, detect evil, etc. down in the priority list. Specifically, move them below rejuvenate. Also, move sanc before rejuvenate unless the conjurer has less than 200 hp. The thought being that if the conjurer has more than 200hp then a sanc buys him more than a rejuvenate would, since it effectively doubles the hp he has. If his current hp is greater than 200, doubling it is a better deal than a rejuvenate.

Please post when you add in the devil changes, I might actually give another evil one a try. Thanks again.

Devils will probably be more a gradual work in progress, because their combat routine is pretty immense and I'm more likely to tackle it in bite-size chunks. For example, having them pick better spells specifically to deal with psychic vampires might be one small chunk, since that seems to be a big problem. Picking slightly smarter spells in cabal raids might be another. Picking maledictions more likely to land or cripple the particular opponent will be another. Dealing with multiple opponents of the binder more effectively will be another. (That one is going to be fun.)

It's harder to write good AI for devils than archons in my opinion because if you're beat up, heal is always a pretty good archon option. Fighting battle berserker? Heal sounds good! Fighting a scion invoker? Heal still sounds pretty good! Because a devil's more built along offensive lines it's harder to have a good default right answer.

You've got more suave demons; it's a good start. This'll be coming along down the pipe, and maybe a little fun with angels after evil's a little more straight. We'll see!

Maybe just for evil invokers, but I would prefer for both. Add a banish spell, that can be used against aggressive planar things (psychic vamp etc). You would get one, maybe two, chances to banish it. If it fails you have to fight it, regardless of mana you have.

Dang, I wish I'd kept my last conjurer (jhyrdaer) a little longer now . This all sounds great, Here's an additional little idea for the devil. It seems to me that most of the devils combat spell repertoire can be divided into 2 groups - spells that are pure maladictions, and spells that do damage and may or may not have maladictioniy affects. Each fight is different, and I think it would be cool if you could attempt to tell the devil to focus on maladicting or dealing out damage with his spells. I could see that being very useful, especially if you can change it on the fly. Maybe give the devil a chance to revolt if you try to talk it into changing its tactics if you're in battle while making it completely safe when you aren't 'bloody'.

just a thought.

Well this is the list I kept from the last time I played an evil conjurer. This is how I'd divide the spells into categories. I'm sure this is based on personal playstyle, but it may help with the AI.
Category 1- Aura, Barrier, Shield, Protective Shield, Fly

Category 2- Acid Storm, Hellfire, Acid Blast, Unholy Word, Harm, Vampiric touch, Ice needles, fireball

Category 3- Poison, Plague, Blindness, Weaken, Fumble, Fear

Category 4- Slow, Wither, Rot, Confuse, Soften, Curse

I'd love it if devils did all of cat 1 out of combat. Then do a cat 4, cat 3, cat 2 rotation or possibly a cat 4, cat 3, cat 3, cat 2 rotation. That would go a long way with devils. One other thing about devils is that they quit using their spells when attacked. I can understand archons doing this, but perhaps devils should still spell up whoever is striking them.

On a sidenot is that nightgaunt echo possible?

Shield shouldn't be in there.

Perhaps modify the vampiric touch Devils currently use so that it gives half the drained hps to the conjurer, and gives less and less hps to the conjie with each vamp-touch.. Would put them more on par with archons, thats for sure.

>Perhaps modify the vampiric touch Devils currently use so
>that it gives half the drained hps to the conjurer, and gives
>less and less hps to the conjie with each vamp-touch.. Would
>put them more on par with archons, thats for sure.

Maybe, maybe not. But only if the devil is happy with the conjie.

A lot of this has been gradually going live. Minor tweaking and some cosmetic changes might still occur but I believe devils are very close to where I think they should be now.

The biggest leap forward is that devils should spend a lot less time casting spells that are guaranteed to be useless or near useless on their chosen targets. For example, not trying to blind someone who's already blinded, etc. This gives them the impression of doing a lot more since each spell generally has at least a chance of doing something useful.

Angels are my next mini-project along these lines; specifically I'm thinking they won't spam rescue so much when the conjurer isn't tanking, and one other little fun surprise for good/neutral conjurers using them.

I got a few free minutes this afternoon, so these are done and coming soon to a crash/reboot near you.

I believe this concludes everything that was on my mental list to tweak for this class at this point. I'll have to see how it all shakes out down the road.

>Angels are my next mini-project along these lines;
>specifically I'm thinking they won't spam rescue so much when
>the conjurer isn't tanking, and one other little fun surprise
>for good/neutral conjurers using them.

I do have one small request though.(may not end up being small, but oh well). Can you check out the responses of bouncers in the inn with regards to things conjurers can do. I've had the following things happen for sure, but I bet there is more: My servitors attack someone (think it was an angel), and the bouncers attack me, someone came in with a demon that attacks me and the bouncers attack me, I conjure in the inn and the elemental turns on me bouncers attack me. Sometimes the bouncers choice of target almost seems random. If you get time for this, great, if not thanks for what you already did.

Maybe just dodge the inn if your a conjurer :s


Yhorian

I also declare world peace.

nt

.

See if you're getting the tiara back from me now, bitches!

(n/t)

.

Splntrd

However I was in the inn with a lowbie one time. A conjurer came in with that demon that attacks everything on sight. It attacks me, and the bouncers jumped me as well. I took a mob death to bouncers, and I was the one attacked.

That's FUBAR. Got a log to post to the bug board?

Splntrd

Its just the psychic vampires 'malaise' that gets you, it makes it impossible to use an npc healer while fighting it, most of your actions become useless and its hard enough to defeat it as it is

Maybe replace it with some kind of attacks similar to a fiend (terror based ideas) to compliment mental knife(which is deadly enough in long fights as it is) and the 'mind vampire' them. Thanks for the changes done already.


Yhorian.

Not yet.

Is it just that hard to beat with a devil, or with a demon also? Angel? I assume archon isn't too bad.

I'd just make malaise subject to resist mental though.

I have killed psychic vamps without an archon, but sometimes I die to them instead.

Personally, I think malaise is a good danger to face. Just be better if it could be managed somewhat using resist mental. Not to be immune, but to get a reduce effectiveness malaise, perhaps.

Only one elemental is capable of hitting it. It's also immune to the vast majority of devil spells and most demons attacks - I don't know if Challegha can hit it or not, but the others cant. The only chance I had of surviving was if I both had a/b/s up, a friend with me, + a fire elemental. Also the vampires attack spell is beyond brutal. Needless to say, just about every vampire that caught me snooping killed me. I lost a lot of con to that

After I fought one of each I stopped using the spells altogether.

Now these are the kind of changes I like. The familiar sharing protections is a cool idea. Lower level devils need to be better as well as more interesting. Devils need more personality! Maybe even give devils something like deathly touch that gives hp to the conjurer? I've played both sides and devils definately need some love compared to their Archon cousins. Sounds good so far though.

That which does not kill us,
makes us stronger.

Evil conjies need those tweaks. I would love to see the familiars being part of the attacks/utilities instead of just being used to scout around.