Might & Magic 6 mod: MAW; Monsters, Arts & Wonders [30/7/23 update]

[Malekitsu]

Bug:
paladins don't get mana regen from meditation skill.
30 mana meditation 1 seraph has mana regen, but 36 mana mediattion expert 4 paladin does not!

thanks for reporting, fixed, just download latest version.

Question:
where can I see combo points for rogues?

Combo points are not shown yet, I hope to be able to create an icon to show them somewhere soon

Edit: so far, rogues feel lame.
They cannot earn combo points in ranged combat - therefore, they loose to an archer in every practical way:
- archers have more hp - therefore, require less attention from healers.
- archers have strong bows and strong ranged spells. Rogues have only bows. They need combo points to have good spells. Which they can only earn in melee.
- In theory, rogues can deliver insane damage in melee.
- But! Archers can too, if they go deep into Dark. Dark magic is inaccessible for rogues at all.
- Alternative way to get a super-strong melee archer - go deep into Fire magic. Rogues can get fire magic, but it is reduced to mostly melee (because of 50% damage penalty without combo points). Archer can happily use fire both at range and in melee.

So why should I have a rogue, when I can get a druid, a sorcerer, a necromancer, or an archer instead?

the archer is stronger in ranged fights indeed.
Rogue is supposed to be melee and with some mastery will deal huge damage.
Also dodge is not to understimate, it's really strong.
An idea could be to make rogues to generate combo points with bow, but I'm not sure about that.

------
Here some update:
We've added item and stat rework.
There is some work left do, but items should feel much more exciting now.
We will announce officially once we are done polishing

[Gray Magic Expert]

Combo points in ranged fights:
Why not use the same melee mechanics, but with additional restriction on current energy?
For example: If rogue has, say > 80 energy, then a successful ranged attack provides a combo point, and also gets all other bonuses. But if rogue has less than 80 energy - ranged attack is completely normal. Melee will be still much more efficient for combo, but it won't be absolutely necessary anymore!

Some balance considerations:
- Swordsmen enemies feel absolutely busted! Two master swordsmen feel more dangerous than two Doom Knights! And three master swordsmen are stronger than 2 Cusinarts! I understand that swordsmen were buffed, but the current version is ridiculous. Respectable defence + Terrifying damage + Impressive attack speed = death incarnate.
- In general, many high damage melee foes feel a bit unfair in unfun way. On one hand, they are easy to avoid using the dumb AI. On other hand, if AI does outsmart you - you are in deadly danger, because the movement speed of monsters is greater than yours. I would consider reducing movement speed of some tier 3 melee monsters. In particular, Ogre Chieftains and Master Swordsmen. Maybe also Brigands. Thematically, it can be justified as those monsters being in the second wave of attack. And gameplay-wise, this will allow for more interesting tactics, IMO.
- Skeletons are OP for their level. The ranged attack makes them unbearable because they appear in huge crowds. The skeleton field in the north-east of Mire of Damned is arguably the scariest part of the whole location!
- On the other hand, Hydras feel absolutely pathetic. They are weaker than earth elementals! And on top of that, Poisonous hydras have no ranged attack!
- Tier 3 Baa priests have OP magic. 50-something Flying Fist is "you just die, lol" level of damage. I undestand that Baa clergy are balanced as glass cannons. And for the most part, this idea works as intended. But the overkill amount of physical damage feels unwarranted.

Some mechanics questions:
- Charm spell works 100% of the time, unlike other debuffs. Is this intended?
- Berserker gets similar skill bonuses to damage as the paladin does. On one hand, this makes sense. On the other hand this is not mentioned in the class description at all.
- How does shield damage reduction works? Is it multiplicative, or additive? How much would one knight with 20 shield provide? And how much would be given by two knights, with 10 points each?

Edit:
Is it possible to download paladin mana fix without all Item and Stats rework? Just so my testing games feel more comparable to each-other.

[RawSugar]

Shield:
Shield reduces damage taken by 1%, meaning damage is *0.99^shield. 10+10 gives same benefit as 20 (damage reduced by 18%) so more shield bearers give better protection for less investment. Knight gives double reduction 0.98^20 =33% reduction. This is for all party not just the wearer.
The reasoning for knight getting double rather than tying it to other skills is to give knight some specialization options and a way to contribute in ranged combat. you can choose to skip shield altogether, you can invest heavily or you can get a few points and still get a large benefit.
Tying it would mean knight losing the bonus they have to shield and instead of options you'd just get all knights being ok in ranged combat. boring

Seraphs are defo more akin to paladins, using clerics as superclass is an easy way of getting around not giving them weapon bonus to damage though. That said seraphs already make good casters/healers. Just forget about the parent class tbh:)

Rogues get a ton of extra melee damage. Until we figure out how to display combo points i'd suggest using them simply as weapon/bow (with water magic at 4 for TP escapes). Their weapon damage is very high when specialized and ranking mastery allows you to frontload the damage dealing insane damage in first few blows. I cant say how they will work with spells cause i couldnt for the life of me figure out how many combopoints they had

Monsters; you're gonna find that some monsters are stronger than others, most of this is vanilla behaviour. Cuiainarts deal a bit less damage than you'd expect for some reason. we have a dampener in place on physical damage that could maybe be smarter and depend on damage pr level as well as monsterlevel. Priests of baa; you only need to kill a few until you are relatively high level. from level 60 or so they arent so intimidating.

charm working 100% and seraph damaging stoned enemies sound like happy bugs

Just download only the file for meditation-sp-regen and you will only get those changes

[Malekitsu]

Is it possible to download paladin mana fix without all Item and Stats rework? Just so my testing games feel more comparable to each-other.

new item rework and stats changes are set to "false" by default, similiar to reworked classes, so it's safe to download

Combo points in ranged fights:
Why not use the same melee mechanics, but with additional restriction on current energy?
For example: If rogue has, say > 80 energy, then a successful ranged attack provides a combo point, and also gets all other bonuses. But if rogue has less than 80 energy - ranged attack is completely normal. Melee will be still much more efficient for combo, but it won't be absolutely necessary anymore!

That's an idea.
Ideally the rogue should be the guy able to kill 2-3 monsters really quickly with energy and then to be slighty weaker.
Ideally I want rogue to be the melee version of archer, a pure glass cannon.
So if you want ranged archer should be the way to go.
That said I agree that while rogue is supposed to be melee it shouldn't be feeling to bad to play ranged when needed
I could make a toggle skill with "E" saying your current combo points and making bow to spending energy like melee attacks.
Another idea is:
For ranged fights making damage to 80% instead of 50% when there are no combo points should make it a worthy caster.
Let me know which one looks better for you.

[Gray Magic Expert]

Shield:
Shield reduces damage taken by 1%, meaning damage is *0.99^shield. 10+10 gives same benefit as 20 (damage reduced by 18%) so more shield bearers give better protection for less investment. Knight gives double reduction 0.98^20 =33% reduction. This is for all party not just the wearer.
The reasoning for knight getting double rather than tying it to other skills is to give knight some specialization options and a way to contribute in ranged combat. you can choose to skip shield altogether, you can invest heavily or you can get a few points and still get a large benefit.
Tying it would mean knight losing the bonus they have to shield and instead of options you'd just get all knights being ok in ranged combat. boring

In my experience, Champions are extremely strong bow users, even with 8 skillpoints only. So a range-combat knight already has a skill to focus around. And for ranged defence for the whole party, there is always an option of equipping a staff (MainHand weapon skill is definitely well-leveled).

So shield feels like a very secondary skill to invest into. I think, partial* skill-sharing between Shield and Dagger+Sword would be very useful for encouraging trying different stuff. (*By partial skill-sharing, I mean like the magic skills. Of course it's likely a bit harder to implement for Sword/Shield, because there is already full skill-sharing bewteen Sword/Dagger)

Seraphs are defo more akin to paladins, using clerics as superclass is an easy way of getting around not giving them weapon bonus to damage though. That said seraphs already make good casters/healers. Just forget about the parent class tbh:)

Seraph being like paladins feels like a bit wasted opportunity, IMHO. In the end, Paladins have extremely versatile weapon choice when seraphs and exactly the same magic. Thus, Seraph class feels like a boring addition, which either overshadows the paladin, or is mostly irrelevant. Some more interesting build options would be very welcome!

Rogues get a ton of extra melee damage. Until we figure out how to display combo points i'd suggest using them simply as weapon/bow (with water magic at 4 for TP escapes). Their weapon damage is very high when specialized and ranking mastery allows you to frontload the damage dealing insane damage in first few blows. I cant say how they will work with spells cause i couldnt for the life of me figure out how many combopoints they had

Can I get a more detailed description of Rogue mechanics? I have a lot of questions:

- Rogues get similar critical strike and bow bonuses as the archers do, correct?
- Melee attacks can generate combo points. Those attacks spend energy and get bonus +5% damage from ranks in mastery skill, right?
- Combo points are stored indefinitely, and get spent upon casting a magic spell, correct?

- How does the spell damage gets adjusted between mastery skill and the combo-point modifier?
- How does combo-point system work with AOE spells like Fireball, Death Blossom and Inferno?
- How does combo system work with multi-shot attacks, like Sparks, Meteor Shower, Poison Spray or Ice Blast?
- How does combo system work with Mass Distortion?

- What happens, if the combo-finisher fails to damage any monsters by colliding into a wall?
- Do non-damage spells consume combo points?

- Do arrows get bonus damage from Speed points?
- Do spells get bonus damage from Speed points?
- Do scrolls/wands get modified damage from Speed and/or combo system?

- Which attacks/monster spells can and cannot be dodged?

Edit: Another 2 questions about shield skill:
- does damage reduction apply to enemy spells?
- If yes, how does it interact with aoe spells like fireball?

[RawSugar]

Added some stuff:
Equalized mode (set =true in MM6.ini to enable) will smoothen out difficulty. it compares monster level to player level so that monsters that are higher level than player will deal less damage and monsters that are lower level will deal more. High level monsters are still stronger regardless of your current level, in terms of strength the effect is ca to halve the difference in level (a level 55 player fighting a level 5 monster will take and deal damage as if fighting a level 30 monster).
This gives a lot more freedom of movement, letting you, with difficulty, clear areas that before would be nigh impossible, while also making sure lower level dungeons arent too easy. Dungeons with high gaps in level between monsters provide a more constant, fun threat level.

New classes:

Shadow; sorcerer subclass, starts almost immune to damage but also with very low mana (hp/sp is 1 pr level) and damage. Can either tank for the party or invest in mastery which greatly increases mana regen, damage dealt but also damage taken (which is 1% pr rank in mastery).

Shaman; druid subclass. A melee fighter that gains a variety of bonuses to melee attacks from his magic schools (damage, healing and toughness)

Herbalist; druid subclass. A healer class with -15% damage. Gains bonus to healing depending on how low target life is, as well as a large bonus to single target heals.

Ashikari; archer subclass. hybrid class that gets bonus to melee damage depending on spell school ranks and a bonus to spell damage, low mana but siphons mana on melee attacks.

Grey knight: Knight subclass. Deals lower damage but has access to light and dark magic and casts Day of protection and day of the gods at double rank for 0 mana. Mastery gives him damage reduction when at low hitpoint, benefit increases exponentially making a Grey Knight tank a possibility.

@Gray magic expert (btw is that warhammer or some other system?) ; Bow skill is a little odd in that it gives a huge benefit for first 8 ranks, at higher levels you will fine the knight lacking unless you invest heavily in bow.
I actually find seraphins to be one of the classes that change gameplay the most, providing healing midcombat makes for very smooth gameplay
shield reduces damage from all ranged attacks including fireball.
Rogues get archer bonus to weapon and bow and yeah get bonus damage from mastery, not sure how the combo points function exactly but i dont think they are stored indefinitely.

[Gray Magic Expert]

New classes:

- Shadow looks like a bait for exploits. (Like going water 4, air 4 and everything else into bodibuilding, to run deep into enemy territory and set up Loyd Beacons)
- Herbalist - looks OP. Having a dedicated utility specialist with super-powerful healing and a staff skill looks like a must pick for most melee-oriented parties. Druid already is very good in this role - and now we trade irrelevant source of damage for EVEN MORE healing?
- Ashikari - from description, it looks like a superior archer in every practical way imaginable. Low mana on elemental specialist is not crucial, when you have lots of bow skill with Archer bonus damage.
- Grey Knight - super-buffed day of the gods and day of protections on either a tank or a melee damage specialist look op. Damage would be provided by other classes anyway...

@Gray magic expert (btw is that warhammer or some other system?) ; Bow skill is a little odd in that it gives a huge benefit for first 8 skills points, at higher levels you will fine the knight lacking unless you invest heavily in bow.
I actually find seraphins to be one of the classes that change gameplay the most, providing healing midcombat makes for very smooth gameplay
shield reduces damage from all ranged attacks including fireball.
Rogues get archer bonus to weapon and bow and yeah get bonus damage from mastery, not sure how the combo points function exactly but i dont think they are stored indefinitely.

Nah, nickname is just M&M Grey Magic skill meme with a silly spelling!
So far, bow skills scales extremely well on knights and archers. If I decide to go ranged - I won't be dissapointed. And if I would go melee - than I will find utility in other places, like super-attack speed mace+dagger Paralyse build, or just plain staff 30-something nonsense.
And knights are very useful at ranged combat just for their HUGE hp pools! This works even without any bodybuilding ranks! So far, my two champions perform well beyond my expectations.
Seraph and Healing midcombat - a dedicated healer caster (druid, or cleric, or paladin) feels pretty comaparable to seraph in this regard. Once you get enough mana regen - you never run dry on mana.

[RawSugar]

try the new classes first , i dont think you will find them imba.
Shadows lose their damage reduction if they are the only cat left conscious.
Herbalist cure wounds still heals less than power cure but for lower mana. the formula for heal vs life% is *(175%-life% left) meaning if target has more than 75% life he will actually heal less. On high level thats an issue because you want to be at full level in case you miss a saving throw. They also dont have access to spirit
Ashikaris deal about same damage as archers, they get a minus to damage and then a bonus from magic. The lower mana evens out the damage to spells and mana steal.
Grey knight is held in check by the need to invest in several different skills.

[Gray Magic Expert]

try the new classes first , i dont think you will find them imba.
Shadows lose their damage reduction if they are the only cat left conscious.
Herbalist cure wounds still heals less than power cure but for lower mana. the formula for heal vs life% is *(175%-life% left) meaning if target has more than 75% life he will actually heal less. On high level thats an issue because you want to be at full level in case you miss a saving throw. They also dont have access to spirit
Ashikaris deal about same damage as archers, they get a minus to damage and then a bonus from magic. The lower mana evens out the damage to spells and mana steal.
Grey knight is held in check by the need to invest in several different skills.

This addresses all hypothetical concerns. BTW, if my party has two shadows standing, they both loose damage reduction, right?
I am still suspicious about gray knights, though... But I'll try them eventually, and see for myself, how good they work in actual play.

Two questions, though:
1) With so many different character classes, it would be cool to have multiple different subclasses of one class in the same party. Like Berserker + Paladin, or Ashikary + Rogue. Would it be possible to enable this eventually?
2) How to get around instant death-inflicting monsters with so many characters having no access to Rise Dead spell? When the sole resurrect char gets insta-killed - you are in trouble. Sure, there are Master Healers, and teleportation magic to somewhat address this issue, but those two methods are very inconvenient...

[RawSugar]

Weapon skills are mildly exponential, needing to divert more than half your skillpoints to other skills means a huge dent in damage.
yeah if only shadows are left they all lose the reduction
I'm actually having the issue w wanting combos, i dont think there's a good way, but what i'll do is making another class the superclass. kinda a wonky solution tho, but possible.
I think at least 1/3 classes still have raise dead, but yeah thats defo an factor when putting together your party

[Malekitsu]

Can I get a more detailed description of Rogue mechanics? I have a lot of questions:

- Rogues get similar critical strike and bow bonuses as the archers do, correct?
- Melee attacks can generate combo points. Those attacks spend energy and get bonus +5% damage from ranks in mastery skill, right?
- Combo points are stored indefinitely, and get spent upon casting a magic spell, correct?

- How does the spell damage gets adjusted between mastery skill and the combo-point modifier?
- How does combo-point system work with AOE spells like Fireball, Death Blossom and Inferno?
- How does combo system work with multi-shot attacks, like Sparks, Meteor Shower, Poison Spray or Ice Blast?
- How does combo system work with Mass Distortion?

- What happens, if the combo-finisher fails to damage any monsters by colliding into a wall?
- Do non-damage spells consume combo points?

- Do arrows get bonus damage from Speed points?
- Do spells get bonus damage from Speed points?
- Do scrolls/wands get modified damage from Speed and/or combo system?

- Which attacks/monster spells can and cannot be dodged?

1) yes, they do
2) Energy spending attack will deal a base of 20% bonus damage+10% per mastery point. Combo point spender will do 5% extra damage per combo point per mastery point.
3) they are stored indefinitely, even resting shouldn't reset them, DAMAGING with spell will reset them. Not dealing damage will not spend them.

4) mutiplicatively, so mastery 10 will make you deal base damage+120% damage, which can crit, so 220%*3 damage=660% making oneshot hit possible (might change that in the future to be additive).
5/6) Only the first enemy hit will get increased damage (assassin lore).
7) mass distorsion damage will be increased aswell

8) no combo point will be spent
9) no

10) no, only melee damage
11) no
12) no speed modifier, but consume combo points, just like normal spells

13) any kind of damage

[Malekitsu]

Here an example of you might find end game with item rework.

[Gray Magic Expert]

-Combo finisher is always a spell, right?
-5% damage per mastery point to combo finisher is multiplicative, or additive?

Assume the following:
I cast Mastery 10, Master Air 10 Staruburst with 0 combo points, and all stars hit two foes. How much damage each foe would get (assuming no resistances)?
Same, if I have 1 combo point?
Same, if I have 4 combo points?
Same, if I have 5 combo points?

And I also have a Skill Emphasis question - what is a "saving throw", which requires full HP?

Edit: For clarity, changed Air 10 into Master Air 10. Of course, by the time one gets Starburst, master air is typically is at hand, but it is better to have full information.

[Malekitsu]

-Combo finisher is always a spell, right?
-5% damage per mastery point to combo finisher is multiplicative, or additive?

Assume the following:
I cast Mastery 10, Master Air 10 Staruburst with 0 combo points, and all stars hit two foes. How much damage each foe would get (assuming no resistances)?
Same, if I have 1 combo point?
Same, if I have 4 combo points?
Same, if I have 5 combo points?

And I also have a Skill Emphasis question - what is a "saving throw", which requires full HP?

Edit: For clarity, changed Air 10 into Master Air 10. Of course, by the time one gets Starburst, master air is typically is at hand, but it is better to have full information.

I't multiplicative:
Here the full formula:
when combo point are from 1 to 4
Damage*(1+0.2*comboPoint)*(1+mastery*0.05)
when combo points are 5:
Damage*2.5*(1+mastery*0.05)
so at mastery 20 and 5 combo points you will deal 5x damage.

As for any multi hit spells:
for starburst only the first enemy hit by the first meteor will get extra damage, making it a bad spell to spend combo points.
Ideally you will go mostly for single target spells.
I've update Assassin to deal more base damage without combo point based on promotion:
Base: 50%
1st promotions: 65%
2nd promotion: 80%
make sure to download latest version

[the beavers1]

Hello! Trying this mod out for the first time (nightmare mode of course) and Ive noticed a sizeable problem from the get go, my paladin has a negative mp regeneration -20 per 'tick' and it makes spells impossible, death doesnt fix this, sleeping doesnt either. Would be great to be able to play as a paladin but I may just start a new game with a knight instead.

[RawSugar]

Hi, I can't duplicate this bug. Are you playing a normal paladin or have you enabled the PaladinAsBerserker? Only the berserker should have this feature. Have you tried redownloading if not?

[Malekitsu]

Hello! Trying this mod out for the first time (nightmare mode of course) and Ive noticed a sizeable problem from the get go, my paladin has a negative mp regeneration -20 per 'tick' and it makes spells impossible, death doesnt fix this, sleeping doesnt either. Would be great to be able to play as a paladin but I may just start a new game with a knight instead.

Thanks for reporting, it was an issue with the older release, download the latest version just as this image:


keep in mind there are a lot of settings you can change in MM6.ini, ask anything if you need.

[the beavers1]

Hello! Trying this mod out for the first time (nightmare mode of course) and Ive noticed a sizeable problem from the get go, my paladin has a negative mp regeneration -20 per 'tick' and it makes spells impossible, death doesnt fix this, sleeping doesnt either. Would be great to be able to play as a paladin but I may just start a new game with a knight instead.

Thanks for reporting, it was an issue with the older release, download the latest version just as this image:


keep in mind there are a lot of settings you can change in MM6.ini, ask anything if you need.

Thanks for the reply! I downloaded the newer version but now i cannot play at all I get an error message when I load it up I get this: \MM6MAWNIGHT\mm6\Scripts\General\zASSASSIN.lua:230: 'end' expected (to close 'if' at line 10) near '<eof>'

[Malekitsu]

Hello! Trying this mod out for the first time (nightmare mode of course) and Ive noticed a sizeable problem from the get go, my paladin has a negative mp regeneration -20 per 'tick' and it makes spells impossible, death doesnt fix this, sleeping doesnt either. Would be great to be able to play as a paladin but I may just start a new game with a knight instead.

Thanks for reporting, it was an issue with the older release, download the latest version just as this image:


keep in mind there are a lot of settings you can change in MM6.ini, ask anything if you need.

Thanks for the reply! I downloaded the newer version but now i cannot play at all I get an error message when I load it up I get this: \MM6MAWNIGHT\mm6\Scripts\General\zASSASSIN.lua:230: 'end' expected (to close 'if' at line 10) near '<eof>'

thanks again, an "end" in the code got eaten by a rushing copy-paste
fixed now, either download again or just substitute the zAssassin file

[the beavers1]

Thanks! One thing i noticed, not sure if its a bug, but if I level up chain, I also level up leather, not a huge break in the game but a strange thing nonetheless.