THE TRENT WAR --- a new campaign!

[Ghoul King]

I've been enjoying the mod, though tbh the current difficulty tuning feels like everything is two difficulty levels ahead of the base game -Normal feels morel like the base game's Impossible.

That said, some issues:

-A random-but-consistent bug I've run across is where a specific battlegroup will end up always crashing the game upon the completion of a specific enemy stack's turn. My first run is unable to get past the first three islands, for example, because the Unicorn Hero guarding the next Sea Chart always causes this crash on the first turn, but a Mage and Paladin that I've started since then don't get this crash on this particular Hero. Conversely, the Mage has one Item where the keeper fight always crashes the game on the second-to-last enemy's move, so I'm probably not going to be able to upgrade the Item until I'm much more overwhelmingly powerful, if ever. So it's 'random' in the sense that different files end up with different battlegroups causing the crash, but it's consistent in that if a given battlegroup causes the crash it will ALWAYS cause the crash.

-The Paladin's Prayer Talent doesn't do anything. Clicking it goes into a targeting mode, and occasionally I've triggered a visual effect on Undead, but it never does anything mechanical (No damage, no fleeing), and it doesn't even end the Paladin's turn.

-In my Mage run, attempting to assemble the pet dragon's four Items into their combo form gave me an Ordinary Helmet with no way to get back the original four Items. I was able to reload, mind, but still.

On a more design-y note, while I've overall been impressed on the tuning of the game so far, I'm a bit uncomfortable with how some specific elements of randomization lean heavily toward a quality-not-variety approach. For example, with the third island my first run had to bait enemies away from the Castle to be able to access it, my second run had no enemies there at all, and my third run had an enemy battlegroup there but can reach the castle without the battlegroup noticing them. This is a particularly memorable example, but it's a recurring thing that some important locations (eg lootables) might be guarded or might not be, and particularly in the very beginning of the game this can easily mean the difference between a run being stonewalled/forced to accept massive casualties vs leveling up/looting Talent Runes/gaining access to a shop with key units and suddenly being able to effortlessly solve a series of previously-problematic fights. Even if the crash weren't blockading my first run, I'd probably never get back to it regardless just because it's struggled so much from worldgen punishing it in this sort of way so consistently.

[Sirlancelot]

I'm glad you have came here to the discussion/debate/feedback topic, Ghoul King.

I used to suffer random crashes to desktop every now and then, until I activated my antivirus (Panda Dome) multimedia/game mode. Perhaps is not related to the causes of yours, but better safe than worry.

What do you think about the topic we're discussing lately? That's it, if it's a good idea or not to include Higher Magic on the Paladin Magic Skill tree and make Resurrection available to Warriors. My initial impression is that it would be preferrable to improve weaker skills of each specific hero rather than incorporate probably the most powerful and symbolic skills of each class.

For example, the Paladin has Prayer and Diplomacy as rather useless skills which could be improved, don't you think?

PS: In the latest pages we have been discussing about simmilar subjects; spells and creatures changes and so on.

[raknefne]

Paladin with Higher Magic: I didnt have the time to have a look at Paladin's skill tree, that's why I did the shortcut by just giving him Higher Magic. I'll remove it, Prayer or Diplomacy need a work, I agree.

Difficulty: A player did the impossible level, and the Xworld has been out for a while, that's why I turned up difficulty. I might lower it though, since I also play Hard, never Impossible in Trent. Since some creatures like Paladin and Ingeneers which were OP have been reduced since version 1.0 it is time to have a look at overall difficulty.

Crashes: I haven't heard about that before. What sometimes help, is taking items on off and try again. Depends.

3rd island: It is random if there is a guard in front of the castle, yes, that was part of the randomization...

[Ghoul King]

If it matters any, I'm playing the Good Old Games version of Crossworlds. Maybe it handles things a bit differently and that's what the crashes are about?

Difficulty-wise, my main point was actually that the mod's description presents the difficulty as being around one level higher than in the base game. Since I prefer to play Armored Princess on Hard, I went with Normal, and while I've ended up enjoying the challenge I still feel it would be better for players to be forewarned that they should probably drop down two difficulty levels compared to the base game, not one.

Skills-wise, I'd tend to agree that buffing/replacing bad Skills is generally a better approach than just passing out the ultimate Skills to other classes. Right now the Paladin basically invalidates the Mage later in the game -admittedly Trent Wars seems to be short enough that this isn't as huge a problem as it could be, but when I noticed my Paladin had Higher Magic I found it quite jarring regardless. Mind, I wouldn't necessarily object to passing out Higher Magic to everyone -it would address some oddities like 'the Mage is the best at grinding Guardian Angel'- but if you went in that kind of direction that would tend to imply a more significant overhaul of class concept/Skills in general. Just passing out Higher Magic to the Paladin with the Mage getting nothing to give them a unique edge is off. (It's not like Archmage is all that great)

As far as the Mind tree goes, in my view its issues are an intersection of

1: Many of its Skills are overpriced. Prayer is lame, but if it was 3 or 4 Mind Runes for the first rank it would be boring-lame, not this-is-not-worth-it-lame.

2: It further suffers from universally essential Skills acting a Rune sinks -no matter who you're playing, you should try to max Trophies as soon as possible, and this is MORE true in Trent Wars than in the base game where money eventually becomes essentially infinite. Which is 15 Mind Runes before you can get on with purchasing other Skills.

3: Lastly is that Mind's Skills that don't suffer directly from either of the above end up suffering it indirectly from the organization of the Skill tree. Voice of the Dragon is a decent enough Skill if you happen to be interested in using animals/dragons, but it's locked behind such a massive amount of Rune sinks it tends to be difficult to justify purchasing it if you're not the Paladin -and even the Paladin will still take forever to get to it since Resurrection is massively more useful AND its requirements are more biased toward Inherently Worthwhile Skills.

Just reorganizing the tree so that eg Prayer is at the END instead of locking off several Skills would go a long way to fix things.

Though on the topic of price points... Trent Wars puts me rather in mind of The Legend when it comes to the overall map design philosophy. Specifically that in The Legend you spend a lot of your time scooping up the easy loot so you can be powerful enough to beat (Well, trivialize in its case, but close enough) easier encounters which unlocks more areas/more improvements to your character and/or army, etc. Which I'm mentioning because I'm a little surprised Trent Wars didn't overhaul Talent Rune costs in the first place; The Legend has MUCH lower costs than later entries in the series because later entries are more focused on making grinding out levels the path to true power, with Talent Runes found in the field primarily mattering for how they add up over time. (With the occasional 'I just need one more Mind Rune- there's one!') Whereas The Legend prices its Skills so that finding individual Runes is actually quite likely to let you purchase a Skill right away, at least until fairly late in the game, and that model seems a bit more in line with Trent Wars' design.

Which I'm mentioning primarily because if you're going to overhaul Skills anyway, then it's a relevant point.

[raknefne]

Thank you GhoulKing for your inputs! I haven't touched either Rage Skills nor Talent Skills in Trent, seems the Paladin skill tree is up next...

Paladin skill tree: For instance in Huntiro's mod, he added overall Resistance to the skill Prayer, just like a saw a The Legend mod that also did that. I will have a look at the Paladin skill tree and lower them, especially Diplomacy/Prayer. Also the Diplomacy Skill could be enhanced by getting more than 100% exp but 200% for instance. I'll post more when starting to plan changes.
Trent is a shorter game, u end up at level 35 or so. And I haven't checked prices for Talent Skills at all compared to vanilla.
I hope it is not necessary to lower Warrior or Mage regarding the amount of runes for Skill deveopment... just Paladin.

The crash bug in Sprudne with an Unicorn hero: I checked the army in the editor, it is just normal units and a hero. I haven't heard anyone else have this crash. Do you also have the Orcs on the Marsh, I think that is needed.

Bug with assembling 4 pieces for Rage item: I tested, yes, strange, it doesn't work, but haven't touched it. Will get back on this... when assembling I got a bow, and when dissambling the 'doll' I got a low level sword, strange...

So far, these are the changes for the next version 1.3 which I have already made:

- Higher Magic Skill removed from Paladin. Resurrection removed from Warrior.
- Difficulty settings: Lowered to 100% - 130% - 170% - 210% (was 100-140-190-250) since some spells and creatures have been nerfed.
- Fromlen (3rd island): A random guard at castle lowered in leadership. It is still randomized if it is here at all (30% chance)
- Fromlen: The ghostship has more random troops, still for free.

Spells:
- Magic Shackles: NO mass effect at level 3. Leadership 125-150-5000%. Mana 10-10-10. Crystal 3-6-8. Price lowered to 1500 (was 3000).

Creatures:
- Ingeneer: The increased 40% ranged damage in 1.21 now fixed so it actually works...
- All bears and Snakes/Swamp Snakes: 'Home ground' gives +1 Ini to Snakes but +1 Moral to Bears (a new feature in 1.21).
- Paladin: Prayer bug fixed, now undead/demons run away in fear as intended. Reload on Healing instead of 1 Charge.

[raknefne]

Paladin Skill Tree will be improved for version 1.3:

- Scouting: 2-2-3 Runes (was 2-3-3). Intellect 1-2-4 (was 1-2-3).

- Trophies: 1-2-4 Runes only (was 5-5-5 and a Magic Rune each level). Gold 5% - 15% - 30%

- Prayer: 6-10-14 Runes (was 10-12-14). Krit 4-9-15% (was 3-7-10%). Shifted with Diplomacy location in skill tree.

- Learning: 7-11-15 Runes (was 11-11-11). Experience 5-15-25% (was 10-15-20%). Intellect 1-2-4 (was 1-2-3).

- Adrenalin: 6-7-8 Runes besides 1 Might Rune (was 7-8-9). In addition, gives +1 Speed/Initiative permanent to: Level 1 units / Level 1-2 units / Level 1-3 units.

- Neatness: 6-7-8 Runes (was 7-9-11).

- Persuation: ????????? Perhaps 1-3-6% Phys. Res.

- Diplomacy: 5-6-7 Mind Runes besides Might Runes (was 8-8-8 or so). 8-14-20% (was 8-12-16%). Will also give Defense to Level 1-3 units: 2-6-10 Defense.

- Ressurection: 8-10-12 Runes (was 12-14-16!)

- Dragon Voice: 6-8-14 Runes besides other (was 9-10-11).


Dragon Voice, Diplomacy, Adrenaline, Prayer, Power of Spirit will all effect for instance summoning like Demon Portal (partly) or Animal Call since they stand stronger. I assume Dragon Voice's moral also effect summonings?


COMMENTS???

[Sirlancelot]

Hmm. I would refrain from making such profound changes all of sudden. We removed Higher Magic because it could be overpowered and now are probably falling in the same mistake by simply going through other path.

I would rather go step by step, making small changes, testing them and then reflecting about the overall feel.

GhoulKing said he enjoyed the challenge, just reported that it should be informed (in the readme, I guess), that every level of difficulty is not one but two levels harder than vanilla.

The Paladin skill tree. Before making any change, I'd count the total quantity of runes cost of the complete Paladin skills tree, and get assured that this number is still the same at the end of the modifications. That way should be easier to keep balance.

Prayer runes price could be 6-10-14, like you said. The first tier the cheapest so the player who is not interested at all in the skill because thinks is superflous can almost skip it.

Diplomacy. I like the changes WotN introduced for it:

Diplomacy

If an enemy force contains identical unit types to the Hero's current army, up to 3% of the matching enemies will join the player's stacks. This cannot take the player over their Leadership. Additionally, for units the player cannot recruit in this way, 4% of the army deserts, reducing the stack size the player faces, without any penalty to Experience or the like.
2
9

If an enemy force contains identical unit types to the Hero's current army, up to 8% of the matching enemies will join the player's stacks. This cannot take the player over their Leadership. Additionally, for units the player cannot recruit in this way, 8% of the army deserts, reducing the stack size the player faces, without any penalty to Experience or the like.
2
8

If an enemy force contains identical unit types to the Hero's current army, up to 12% of the matching enemies will join the player's stacks. This cannot take the player over their Leadership. Additionally, for units the player cannot recruit in this way, 12% of the army deserts, reducing the stack size the player faces, without any penalty to Experience or the like.
2
7

https://www.vigaroe.com/2018/10/warr...is-part-2.html

I'd avoid/not so keen about raising resistances... as I stated some messages ago, the game has not a cap at 75-80%, just at the outrageous 95%, which is basically the same like not having a cap at all.

- Scouting: 2-2-3 Runes (was 2-3-3). Intellect 1-2-4 (was 1-2-3)

Reasonable and interesting change, because the third level of the skill was previously a bit meh. I'd keep the runes price intact, however. It's an essential skill.

Trophies: 2-2-3 Runes only (was 5-5-5 and a Magic Rune each level)

I disagree a bit with GhoulKing here. I'm level 20 at my Paladin playthrough and money is not a problem/issue. Perhaps it was at the beggining, but honestly never bother me or felt wrong.

And again, this is a relevant skill (not essential, but important nevertheless), thus I'd rather keep vanilla runes cost, or lowered them just a little.

Learning: 7-11-15 Runes (was 11-11-11). Experience 5-15-25% (was 10-15-20%). Intellect 1-2-4 (was 1-2-3)

Good approach. However... lowering the first tiers runes cost so much could have the effect of making the paladin skills tree so cheap for all classes, that it would preferable to be a warrior or a mage.

- Adrenalin: In addition, gives +1 Speed/Initiative permanent to: Level 1 units / Level 1-2 units / Level 1-3 units.

Sounds tempting, but maybe a bit out of scope. How about just +1 to speed? There're already other skills that raise Initiative.

Neatness: 6-7-8 Runes (was 7-9-11)

Not sure about this. In principle, I think it's a very relevant and advantageous skill and would keep its runes cost intact. Otherwise would make Alchemy even less important than it is already.

Ressurection: 8-10-12 Runes (was 12-14-16! That's 42 in all)

Absolutely disagree. Ressurection is the best paladin skill and should keep its runes cost intact.

In fact, I would raise the third layer of the skill runes cost up to 18 or more. You want to make Holy Armor and other skills obsolete and expendable? Pay for it.

Prayer could be improved with +5 att/def to all level 1-3 when maxed

Good approach, but probably a bit excessive. How about +3?

These are my first impressions after reading your last post.

[Sirlancelot]

In this web you can easily count the amount of runes that would cost changing all the skills that we're talking about:

https://www.celestialheavens.com/kingsbounty/hs-en.htm

Considering that in order to modify them you need to also pay for other skills, the numbers I get, are:

20 Might runes.
189 Mind runes.
16 Magic runes.

[raknefne]

Ok, thx for inputs. Regarding diplomacy, I don't have the capability to change so player get exp for deserting/joining troops, still I never developed it in WotN.
I will hold more back then with the skills. Uploading v1.3 later.

[raknefne]

Trent version 1.3 released for download (see first post)
======================================

- Warrior Hero: Resurrection removed.
- Paladin Hero: Higher Magic Skill removed and the skill tree improved.
- Difficulty settings: Lowered to 100% - 130% - 170% - 210% (was 100-140-190-250) since some spells and creatures have been nerfed.
- Fromlen (3rd island): A random guard at castle lowered in leadership and moved to another location in Fromlen, still random if it appears.
- Fromlen: The ghostship has more random troops, still for free.
- Item bug: The 4 rage items from 'Orcs on the Marsh' that can be mixed to a new item 'Dragon Toy' didn't work properly. I had to remove the option to sample the 4 items, no clue how to repair, same code as in vanilla.
- Item; Dragon Toy: Can now be found, not crafted: Price 40.000, Level 4, Rage 8, Petattack 10%
- Item 'Helm of Antenna', former part of 'Dragon Toy': Price lowered and the Initiative penalty for level 3-5 removed.

Spells:
- Magic Shackles: NO mass effect at level 3. Leadership 125-150-5000%. Mana 10-10-10. Crystal 3-6-8. Price lowered to 1500 (was 3000).

Creatures:
- Ingeneer: The increased 40% ranged damage in 1.21 now fixed so it actually works...
- All bears and Snakes/Swamp Snakes: 'Home ground' gives +1 Ini to Snakes but +1 Moral to Bears (a new feature in 1.21).
- Paladin: Prayer bug fixed, now undead/demons run away in fear as intended. Reload on Healing instead of 1 Charge.

Mind Skill Tree has been changed a bit:
- Scouting: Intellect 0-2-4 (was 1-2-3).
- Trophies: 2-4-6 Mind Runes (was 5-5-5 and a Magic Rune each level). Gold 5%-15%-30%
- Prayer: 6-12-16 Mind Runes (was 10-12-14). Krit 3-7-12% (was 3-7-10%). Shifted with Diplomacy location in skill tree.
- Learning: 7-14-16 Mind Runes (was 11-11-11). Experience 5-14-22% (was 10-15-20%). Intellect 0-2-4 (was 1-2-3).
- Adrenalin: 6-7-11 Mind Runes (was 7-8-9). In addition, gives +1 Speed Level 1 units / +1 Speed Level 1-2 units / +1 Speed & Initiative Level 1-3 units.
- Persuation: When maxed, +1 Moral all including Neutrals and Droids (was only for Demons & Lizardmen at level 3). Costs 2 extra Mind Runes for Level 3.
- Diplomacy: 6-7-8 Mind Runes (was 8-8-8 or so). 5-10-15% (was 8-12-16%). Now gives Defense to Level 1-3 units: 2-6-10 Defense.
- Spirit of Power: 6-8-10 Mind Runes (was 8,8,8 ), so total the same amount of runes.
- Voice Dragon: 10-11-11 Mind Runes (was 9-10-11).
- Resurrection: Costs 2 extra Mind Runes for Level 3.


Number of Rune changes in v1.3 if all is maxed in the Mind Tree compared to vanilla:
Might: 0
Mind : 0 (Trophies, Diplomacy & Prayer are cheaper. Resurrection, Learning, Voice of the Dragon & Persuation are more expensive).
Magic: -2 (Trophies)
The following skills are stronger than vanilla: Scouting, Learning, Prayer, Adrenalin, Persuation, Diplomacy.
Generally the first level is cheaper than vanilla but with a smaller bonus.

Examples from the skill enhancements:
Call of Nature and Demon Portal will have stronger units if you upgrade Prayer, Adrenalin or Diplomacy with increased Crit, Defense, Speed and Initiative.
With Maxed Prayer, Persuation and Level 2 Voice of the Dragon a Polar bear will have +3 Morale which gives 59% Crit instead of 30% Crit Chance. Btw, moral does not effect summonings.