Mask of Equity?

[Metathron]

In a recent game, my hero had attained level 34 and maxed all his skills. Then I attacked an enemy hero who had the Mask of Equity, and when I checked his stats, he was at level 60!?! How is that equalizing??

Must be a bug, ought to be fixed.

[Wurtzel]

Two things, as the game only allows for levels up to 40, are you sure you're not using a mod?? 2nd, and I could be wrong, I thought the mask brings one up to the highest level, so therefore YOU should have been up to level 60... (Might be hard to know because one cannot check one's own stats duing combat)

[Metathron]

Huh?

I'm not using any mod that is supposed to tamper with these things, only sharper texture, in-game skill wheel, balanced difficulty mods.

One cannot check one's own stats during combat?? Of course you can, just right click your own hero or the enemy's.

Anyhow, according to the description of the artifact, the artifact is supposed to equalize your hero's stats (in this case, the enemy hero's) up to the level of your hero, e.g. if your hero is level 34 and the enemy hero (who has the Mask) is, say, level 22, the enemy hero should get 12 points to his primary skills, that is, divided among all 4 primary skills, not 12 to each.

At least that's how I understand this.

I remember another odd thing happening a couple of months back where I attacked an enemy castle guarded by a level 20-something hero. I made a silly mistake and loaded the game to siege again, only to find the hero was now level 40-something!

[Wurtzel]

Opps, you're right about checking stats, sorry. Here is a copy and pasted desciption of the item: Mask of Equity
Relic - Helm - Cost: 20000
During combat with an enemy Hero of
superior level, it equalizes the Hero's
level (by increasing Hero's primary
stats) to the enemy Hero's level.

I think the underlying words here are "enemy hero" as opposed to "hero". (meaning yours.) As I understand it means that a hero will be bought up or down to the level of the hero wearing it...

[Metathron]

a hero will be bought up or down

The hero can't be "brought up or down" because the requirement is that the opposing hero is of superior level.

to the level of the hero wearing it...

I was level 34, my opponent with the artifact was level 60, so no.

If the artifact worked correctly, only the enemy hero's (the one with the Mask) stats should have gone up, not his actual level, as per description.

[yuritch]

The Mask is bugged. It doesn't equalize levels, rather it works like this:
if a hero with the mask is lower level than the opponent, the Mask adds DOUBLE the level difference to the hero that wears it. So if 1st level hero with a mask fights a 20th level hero, he will be at 1+2*(20-1)=39th level. Those are just levels though, no abilities are given for them (but stat points are added).
That bug can easily bring a hero to beyond level 40. Max level with the mask would be when a 1st level Hero (wearing a Mask) fights a 40 level hero, he will gain (40-1)*2=78 levels and will be at level 79.

[Wurtzel]

Ahaaaa ! ! ! That explains it well, although it's still a bug. Not a game breaking bug though..

[danhvo]

And, presumably, any ability that is level-dependent, such as the hero's direct damage or specialty, will benefit as well? That sounds like a pretty major bug to me. Just imagine a 79th level necromancer specializing in vampires. His vampire lords will tear everything to pieces.

[yuritch]

A masked hero won't have any abilities though, so while the Vamps will have high stats, they won't have anything like say Expert Defence + Expert Attack (which really helps them).