Shatter Magic

[Humakt]

Anyone else feel Shatter Magic skills are too weak? First, they hardly help you at creeping at all. Second, their only use is if your opponent somehow actually has the skill and spells. And last, they don't seem to lessen the effect of spells enough anyway.

[tb5841]

I thought they were a bit too good... Some of the abilities they give you (Fiery Wrath, Weakening Strike) help quite a lot with creeping.

[Yngvi]

They are too weak: imagine having shatter dark against a high powered necromancer. The necromancer will likely have almost limitless mana, and cheaper spells with sorcery, so who cares if the spells are made more expensive? With expert sorcery, who cares if the necromancer is a little slower in taking the next turn? And often lessing the power will just reduce how long the spell lasts (Mass Slow for 7 turns not 14 is still pretty bad!) With lower lever or less magical heroes it could make a difference, but all in all there are far better options for your barbarian hero.

[okrane]

I disagree

Given the raw power of the barbarians I say it takes just a few rounds in order to crush a magic hero. All you need is to delay the best as possible him unleashing chaos upon your troops.
This means: Shatter Dark and Shatter Destructive are very good.

[Muszka]

I think barbarians were weaker in the H4, the shatter magics are firstly made for MP, if you know the alignment of the opponent, you can make some headaches for enemies.

[tb5841]

They are too weak: imagine having shatter dark against a high powered necromancer. The necromancer will likely have almost limitless mana, and cheaper spells with sorcery, so who cares if the spells are made more expensive? With expert sorcery, who cares if the necromancer is a little slower in taking the next turn? And often lessing the power will just reduce how long the spell lasts (Mass Slow for 7 turns not 14 is still pretty bad!) With lower lever or less magical heroes it could make a difference, but all in all there are far better options for your barbarian hero.

With Expert Shatter Dark, he is casting slow at basic level instead of expert level, which affects your troops much less (-30% initiative instead of -40%). And lowering spellpower is extremely useful against higher level dark spells, and against other magic schools.

[Ar.Pi]

The heck with Slow spells! what about Puppet Master and Frenzy! :/

[Yngvi]

*possible spoiler*

In the Orc campaign, mission 5, when Gotai was attacking the last Academy city, right before Alaric appears, he had no Shatter Dark or any other Shatter. He had expert war machines (gate down first try) expert leadership, expert luck. The Wizard was able to Frenzy my shamans and Puppet Master my Centaurs. I "sacrifced" my goblins to them as bait/obstacles while the others rushed in. Gotai added some Hoard's Anger for some added damage. The Wizard was pulped quite quickly despite his expert Dark Magic.

[okrane]

I wish people here would start talking multiplayer and not those lowsy campaigns.

A strong enemy hero would frenzy/pupper your Untamed Cyclops or Executioners and you would kill yourself.

Expert Shatter Dark helps, even a little against that.

What do you expect, to nulfy completely that magic? Barbarians are strong as they are, mind you

[Yngvi]

Fine! Campaigns aside:
There are two questions here: how powerful is Dark Magic and how effective is Shatter Dark.
Most factions would have trouble against having a high level stack Pupper Mastered, unless they happen to have Magical Immunity or Vampirism or an undead army. Some hero can keep PMing your stacks everytime, whichever one is coming up right after him: you would be in trouble. When I've played as an Expert Dark caster, PM can make it too easy.
My point is I just don't think the Shatter Magics are worth the slot space. With Luck or Leadership or Attack combined with their Blood Rage boosts, they are like an army will all kinds of powerful Light Magic blessings. If you are not in a position to run in and grind the enemy fast, Shatter Dark isn't going to help much anyhow.

[Ar.Pi]

I'm still playing campaign, but if one has Exp Shutter against Exp Dark how what will be the result of casting Puppet master or Frenzy? Less turns affected? Is there a formula?

[parcaleste]

... A strong enemy hero would frenzy/pupper your Untamed Cyclops...

I don't think PuppetMaster works with Cyclops...

[Metathron]

Why wouldn't it work?

[parcaleste]

Cause here in this battle only the Frenzie spell did worked on 'em, you sure it might be just Shattered Dark or they have immunity?

[tb5841]

You need expert dark magic to cast Puppet Master on L7 units. So with expert Shatter Dark, Puppet Master can only be cast on you at advanced level, ie. not on L7 units (only way Puppet Master is affected, I believe).

Frenzy increases unit attack by the same amount at Expert and Advanced level, but at Expert level it lasts twice as long (2 turns instead of one). So Expert Shatter Dark halves its duration.

[parcaleste]

Actualy while watching the SkillWheel I find some of these realy usefull - esp. Shatter Dark with Weakening Strike, Corrupted Soil is also good But I am starting to wonder, cause delaying the other Hero's turn with 25% in Detain Dark sounds, at least, scary

[Ar.Pi]

I would like to know if Detain works with Distract! But no1 seems to know for sure.

[Omega_Destroyer]

The biggest gripe I have about the Shatter skills is that it seems if I have the skill, the computer will never bother casting the appropriate spells.

[Elvin]

I tried to rush a barbarian AI with dungeon twice and both times it had shatter magic by week 2 Either it was damn lucky or it has linked dungeon with shatter destruction though I kinda doubt the latter.

[Omega_Destroyer]

I've noticed similar trends. It seems like the computer always has the logistics skill at higher levels.