Fungus tree - overpowered?

[nemajquan]

I'm somewhat new to the game. When I played the wyrmic class I must of overlooked how op the fungus tree was. Personally if there is any OP thing in this game its a skeleton brawler late game. with shielding runes and race shield can absorb thousands of damage, keep one teleportation rune when shit looks bad. Can disable practically everything and dish out insane amount of damage if put all points in the dex and cunning.

[Zonk]

Just a thought I felt like sharing here:

Anyone else noticed that Wyrmics start with Fungus unlocked while Oozemancers don't...but if you look at things 'thematically', Fungus seems like it would fit the Oozies MUCH more? I mean, Fungus doesn't have much to do with dragons, while on the other hand the concept of better regeneration fits perfectly with oozes, slime...

Of course, locking Fungus for Wyrmics/unlocking it for Oozemancers from the start would likely be very, very bad for balance(Oozemancers don't need buffing at all..Wyrmics, I'm not sure but I don't think they're considered a particularly powerful class? And they'd need another starting generic tree as a replacement perhaps...), but I still wanted to bring this up.

And for the whole issue of mana regen: I agree everyone might as well get some small mana regen, I don't like playing AM but I do (sometimes)like getting Premonition from escorts.
Running out of mana to use it and having to wait for level ups(or switch to mana regen equip just for resting)is just an annoyance. Mana is still different from stamina in the fact that well, it's 'magic' and it gets double fatigue.


Also, really agreeing that Angolwen needs a reward. You could have a choice of rewards(Conveyance, Divination, Aegis, maybe a +Mag boost, or a class-appropriate arcane artifact?), escort style perhaps - this would not be completely symmetrical with Zigur but is that truly necessary?

[SageAcrin]

Giving a meaningful choice (particularly one at the level of power suggested) would make Arcane far more powerful than AM, as it would usually provide a good option to everyone with no downside cost.

I still like the idea of it just being Conveyance.

[HousePet]

How about some mana regen as the Angolwen reward?

[b0rsuk]

Spell/Reward For Urkis 1.00 (locked - it must be locked if it's to be a sidegrade)
Talent1
Passive
mana regen + Silence Immunity (10% * talent_level)
Somewhat useful even if you have no spells - makes your runes immune to Silence. Combos with many mana-using talents from escorts, and Hexes from Grand Corruptor.

Talent 2
Portal to Angolwen
Spell
Activated
A faster way to recall, takes 40 - talent_level * 4 turns.

Talent 3
Mirror Image
Spell
70 Mana cost
Summons a reflection of an enemy (a copy of him). The copy has all talents, but dies after taking 1 damage. Scaling with talent level needs to be determined (duration? cooldown?)

Talent4 - Arcane Leech
Spell
Activated
Range - 8.
You steal duration-based positive effects (Evasion, Blinding Speed, Resolve, Block, from a single enemy. All effects which are not sustained are affected - Resolve the sustain not, but an instance of Resolve (10% fire resistance for 6 turns or whatever) is. It substracts 1 * talent_level turn from duration effects on target and gives them to you. (If enemy has 7 turn Blinding Speed, 4 turn Regeneration you get 5 turn Blinding Speed, 4 turn Regeneration, he is left with 2 turn Blinding Speed, 0 Regeneration). The intriguing part is that it promotes different style than the usual (Stunning Blow on first turn). Go steal that Reflective Skin!

Prodigy - No One's Pawn (tentative name)
You kept your neutrality. Urkis, Grand Corruptor, the only talkable Zigur NPC are still alive. From now on, you can't kill them (they become neutral and invulnerable). You refused to be a part of anyone's schemes. You learned strengths and weaknesses of both. Your balanced point of view allows you to:
- be unaffected by Arcane Disrupting gear
- have innate 50% Damage Shield Penetration
- make 25% of all summoned creatures friendly to you. Each time a creature is summoned, there's a 25% chance it is friendly. Works for both Necromancer and Wilder summons, and more. Special case - also works for Fearscape portals (Valley of the Moon) and Draconic, Demonic, Horror and Undead portals at High Peak.

Alternatively, if Arcane Leech doesn't make it as a talent, it can become a prodigy:
prodigy - Steal Benefits
Requirements - Cunning 50, killed Urkis via Angolwen
Spell
Cooldown 20
Activated
You steal up to 2 duration-based effects from an enemy. (If an enemy has Blindside Bonus(2), Essence of Speed (10), Rampaging(8) you get 2 of these, and enemy loses them.
(A prodigy can get away with stealing even Block or Resolve, a spell - not necessarily)

[Atarlost]

Spell/Reward For Urkis 1.00 (locked - it must be locked if it's to be a sidegrade)

Why does it have to be a sidegrade? Other rewards have been upgraded. For instance I believe that there are versions where killing Urkis didn't have a reward on the antimagic side either. When one was added it was an unlocked tree. No reason the reward for doing so on the Angolwen side must be locked. Almost no classes have talent points to spare so there's little difference between a locked tree and no reward.

Personally I think Aegis is the best match. It's the thematic equivalent of fungus and isn't terribly powerful on its own.

[b0rsuk]

Spell/Reward For Urkis 1.00 (locked - it must be locked if it's to be a sidegrade)

Personally I think Aegis is the best match. It's the thematic equivalent of fungus and isn't terribly powerful on its own.

Which is why many characters, especially non-magic, won't consider it. You need to find shields somewhere else. Fungus, Antimagic is so desired because they give something everyone needs: HP and resistances.

[HousePet]

But Aegis does have a shield in it...

[Kaja Rainbow]

The issues with Aegis've already been discussed earlier in this thread. It's a better boon for spellpower based classes than, say, physical classes. Whereas, everyone gets nearly equal use out of conveyance with only the requirement of equipping stat-boosting gear to take the talent levels. Magic using classes aren't the ones that need an incentive to not go antimagic (indeed, they have no option but to). Besides, many value equipment diversity and access to runes far more than the benefits of the antimagic+fungus trees (which from what I hear don't scale that well for higher difficulties).

As for the proposed reward tree.

Mana regen + silence immunity: still slanted toward magic-using classes, though those with precious runes might consider it maybe (only undead, really). 5 talent points for 50% chance to prevent a single rare status curable with a wild infusion will be a costly investment for many classes. It'd require a more interesting benefit beyond that.

Portal to Angolwen: not worth investing talent points in beyond level 1. And in many cases people would rather recall to the fortress.

Mirror Image: wastes a turn to soak up a single hit. In many situations it'll just be a 1-for-1 turn exchange with your enemy, and when there're multiple enemies it's actually a waste of time. Burning 70 mana just makes that even worse. Spawning multiple harmless images or a single more durable image of yourself would be a somewhat more interesting talent. Leaning toward single more durable image--multiple fragile images would fall easily to AoEs.

Arcane Leech: the only really interesting talent in this entire tree.

Actually, giving access to an useful Prodigy might actually be a good Angolwen reward for many classes. Arcane Leech is an interesting option.

The No One's Pawn prodigy doesn't make much sense lore wise, BTW. Even stone wardens're affected by arcane disrupting gear. And why would random summons ally with you just because you refused to pick sides (a trait actually considered desirable by very few people)? If anything, that sounds more like a specific Friend to All Summons prodigy or something.

[b0rsuk]

I'll think some more about the reward tree, and post an updated version once I'm happy with it. Portal of Angolwen(which is good thematically) is a replacement for an earlier idea of mine - up to 50% Damage Shield Penetration. That would be a good talent, but smells a bit of Zigur. I initially wanted some form of Dispel (everyone likes dispel!) but it smells of Zigur too, so I came up with the Leech idea. Mirror Image is from Heroes of Might and Magic, where the ability to attack first is a great advantage (and it's a very good spell in that game). I want to keep the fragility of images, so I see two ways out:

• Reduce the cost to 40-50 and make it replace Portal to Angolwen.
• Keep it as an expensive 3rd talent, but give it non-regenerating version of Bone Shield(first hit destroys level1 image, level2 needs 2 hits, 3 - three hits...).

Overall, I understand the spell wouldn't be useful in all situations, but I think that's okay. The image is meant as a damage dealer, mostly.

Other ideas - Polymorph. Transforms an enemy into a pig, removing most physical attacks, reducing resistances and armor but increasing defense and movement speed. But that kind of talent probably shouldn't work against bosses, and I want a talent which can be used against them.

[Kaja Rainbow]

Drawing ability design philosophies from other games is enormously flawed. This isn't Heroes of Might and Magic. In that, a good solid hit can take a very large chunk out of the opponent's effectiveness (if they're a stack) or at least their HP (if a hero). But in ToME 4, that's only true with weaker enemies or if you happen to be lucky enough to have your mirror image use a disabling move that works on the target.

Pets with solely defensive utility would be more usable to more classes than pets with solely offensive utility--a pet that did nothing but soak up a few hits would be vastly more desirable to me than a pet that did good offense but dies in a single hit. You speak of utility against bosses, but the problem is that against those survival trumps burst damage. A fragile pet with a Bone Shield-like is an interesting design idea, though.

[Zonk]

I don't see how teleporting to Angolwen is an 'useful'ability when you already have the RoR anyway.

If you go with Mirror images, I'd suggest not making them single hit but have, say, a very small life that means they can still take 2-3 from an average NPC, and perhaps give them a defense/evasion bonus compared to the player.
Maybe have them phase door around randomly and have very weak arcane/light-based attacks?
(hopefully they won't end up hitting the player in the back)

Also, on the pet with bone shield idea: here's a weird alternate idea, pet with low/very low(but still not 1!)life BUT 100% damage affinity.
What does this mean? That it must be killed in a single blow.

[b0rsuk]

A fragile pet with a Bone Shield-like is an interesting design idea, though.

Keep in mind Summoning falls into Nature and Zigur camp. There are no arcane summoners, and I don't think there should be. Sure you can force the idea (Summon Imp! See, it's a familiar, so it's okay!) but I prefer when there's less overlap in functionality. When magic/mindpower split is better defined, it leads to more interesting design I think.

Mirror Image was okay as a concept because it's not ordinary summoning. If one of replacement abilities is to be a summon, it should be with some twist, like player's clone or something.

[Kaja Rainbow]

"No arcane summoners?" Uh? What about necromancers? Paradox Mages and their cloning of both themselves and their enemies? Anothirils can clone an enemy, too, and shadowblades can clone themselves. Alchemists have their golems. Not to mention the psionic classes (including Afflicted here) which don't always fall into the zigur camp, though I guess you might classify them as natural classes.

But point being, there're plenty of meatshield pets on both sides of the magic/antimagic divide.

[Zonk]

Actually...instead of Teleport to Angolwen, what if as the tier 4 talent...

Angolwen teleports to *YOU*!

As in, seriously, summoning a mage NPC, fairly competent and sturdy(they'd have shielding runes, aegis) and with AI that avoids hurting the player though friendly fire.
VERY long cooldown(like, 100) so this isn't likely to be used more than once per battle.
Points in the talent might make boost the NPC moderately, or perhaps boost it slightly but make 2 show up at TL 3 and 3 at TL 5.

Edit: For thematic purposes, it might be nice if the NPC was generated a bit like a rare, with a random name and somewhat randomized talents. Also if they tried to flee through teleport when their life goes down, instead of simply disappearing after X turns(or just give them a very long duration).