Mana Addicts

[Zebulon Ecthelion]

This might be the most flagrantly overpowered culture trait, and it's probably due for a nerf, but I hope they don't give it a flat nerf, but adjust it so that it's more in line with the other unlockable pantheon culture traits.

Which is to say that it has significant drawbacks that make it more appropriate for a themed run rather than being universally good. It's just as good on a Barbarian champion as it is on a heavy astral Mystic wizard king. The "drawback" can hardly be called that. You get -5 morale every turn you don't cast a spell. But there's basically no reason not to cast a spell every turn, even the champions are going to be doing that. So the "drawback" is that you have to do something that you would be doing anyway. And if you don't do it, it's hardly the end of the battle. And in exchange, you get lifesteal attacks on all of your units. That puts it at the top of all culture traits (and head and shoulders above the other pantheon traits) and probably means it has the nerf bat coming for it in the future.

I was hoping that, instead of making it weaker, they would lean more heavily into the "power at a price" angle. Maybe give your units a small amount of cosmic damage as well, alongside the lifesteal. But, in exchange, all your units have an additional mana upkeep and suffer a devastating morale debuff if you ever go into the red on mana. Another thing you might consider adding in is making pops generate research, casting points and/or production, but each pop consumes mana each turn like food.

Thoughts?

[archonsod]

Escrito originalmente por Naram-Sin:

The "drawback" can hardly be called that. You get -5 morale every turn you don't cast a spell. But there's basically no reason not to cast a spell every turn

Well, it assumes you have the mana and casting points to do so and you're up against an enemy who isn't equally stacking the 'trigger on spell cast' effects themselves (well, unless mutual annihilation is viable).

It's more an AI issue than the trait. You get a powerful army with the minor drawback that if something shuts down your magic it's going to turn tail and run as soon as someone looks at it funny. There's a couple of ways to prevent you casting spells, none of which the AI will ever make use of (except by accident if you happen to have your wizard in the fight).
It's not overpowered because it's not alone in that respect, the AI employs some fairly basic general strategies and will nearly always fail to cope with a more specialist strategy employed by the player.

[yuzhonglu]

Escrito originalmente por Flushing:

Escrito originalmente por yuzhonglu:

Mana Addicts is actually very OP in large part because you start with a tier 2 healer. If you're barbarian culture, you get a freaking Shaman. This means it doesn't matter how injured your units are. You can still start a battle and the shaman will provide enough regen to get your units enough health to survive the initial contact.

After that, the health regen leech means you can kill almost any neutral on the map, which means you can quickly clear all of the resources around you. Combine it with cannibalism, and all of these battles provide huge amounts of food and mana for summoning irregulars and expanding your cities, for the snowball.

By turn 28 I have 120 research, 4 cities, 4 full armies, and 30 pop points.

Really cool combo. What Affinities are you pushing? Chaos and Astral with some Nature? Or, just a little Nature?

Starts with 4 Chaos, 1 Nature, 1 Astral. Starting tome is horde for summon irregulars. Absolutely essential to get that ASAP and mass conduits/ mana buildings. Then afterwards I get the nature tome that gets vines. Then the Astral tome for amplify mind (20 knowledge per city is a big deal at that point) and also the Astral blood.

After that it depends. But I like pushing Astral to eventually get the 15 knowledge per magic material culture trait. This literally doubles my research.

[yuzhonglu]

The power of mana addict is that it provides a form of life leech AT THE BEGINNING OF THE GAME. Later on the life leech is not that big of a deal since you can get regen/ life leech from other sources, but early on it's huge because it allows you to clear neutrals long before anyone else can do it. Combine it with cannibalism and every cleared neutral camp provides huge amounts of mana and food.

[Demiurge]

Escrito originalmente por Naram-Sin:

Escrito originalmente por Demiurge:

in your opinion. doesn't make it a fact.

What do you mean "in my opinion?"

It is not an opinion that this game will have balance patches, it is a fact.

it is your opinion that nerfs should come, and it is your opinion that mana addicts is the most overpowered trait (I disagree with you btw). None of those too things are FACTS. If you think that, then you don't know the difference between fact and opinion...

[Demiurge]

Escrito originalmente por Naram-Sin:

Escrito originalmente por XtraLarge63:

There goes the "overly powerful" complaints again...the last aow (AoW3?) that this happenned the developers made the game so hard to win that most people walked away from it. I play with mana addict and ... I win! the charaters still have weaknesses. If you dont like it, don't use it and let the rest of us win

Not really complaining. Just pointing out a pretty obvious fact. No one here has really refuted it except saying that actually nothing needs to be balanced ever and accusing me of trying to ruin their fun like I am personally responsible for the existence of balance patches and if I hadn't said anything, the game would have been kept in a permanent stasis. And maybe the occasional cope post about how Mana Addicts can be effectively countered, but not making the case that it's on par with the other culture traits.

The way I see it, I'm trying to save Mana Addicts. Very often developers will over-compensate and destroy overpowered abilities. I was just suggesting ways to balance it by leaning more heavily into the theme.

again, you don't know what facts mean. Those are your opinions

[Flushing]

Escrito originalmente por Demiurge:

Escrito originalmente por Naram-Sin:

Not really complaining. Just pointing out a pretty obvious fact. No one here has really refuted it except saying that actually nothing needs to be balanced ever and accusing me of trying to ruin their fun like I am personally responsible for the existence of balance patches and if I hadn't said anything, the game would have been kept in a permanent stasis. And maybe the occasional cope post about how Mana Addicts can be effectively countered, but not making the case that it's on par with the other culture traits.

The way I see it, I'm trying to save Mana Addicts. Very often developers will over-compensate and destroy overpowered abilities. I was just suggesting ways to balance it by leaning more heavily into the theme.

again, you don't know what facts mean. Those are your opinions

The issue is, I rarely choose mana addicts over other society options in the astral line, such as mana channelers.

Some posters here are asking for a gentle nerf in order to save it from a more significant one, but it doesn't need a change as is.

You have to sacrifice your entire mana economy to use this or face penalties longwinded battles.

There are countless other ways to get HP back in combat suchs as regen, direct heals from other units, and or combat spells themselves.

On balance, I choose any one of those alternatives over mana addicts and take society traits that let me grow and scale armies quickly.

If OP found a particulary good strategy with it that's great. There are many such strategies in the game but that doesn't make it broken.

By turn 20, I will probably have two to three times the military size of someone who went mana addicts.

[M0rgi]

Escrito originalmente por Flushing:

Escrito originalmente por Demiurge:

again, you don't know what facts mean. Those are your opinions

The issue is, I rarely choose mana addicts over other society options in the astral line, such as mana channelers.

Some posters here are asking for a gentle nerf in order to save it from a more significant one, but it doesn't need a change as is.

You have to sacrifice your entire mana economy to use this or face penalties longwinded battles.

There are countless other ways to get HP back in combat suchs as regen, direct heals from other units, and or combat spells themselves.

On balance, I choose any one of those alternatives over mana addicts and take society traits that let me grow and scale armies quickly.

If OP found a particulary good strategy with it that's great. There are many such strategies in the game but that doesn't make it broken.

By turn 20, I will probably have two to three times the military size of someone who went mana addicts.

Mana addicts doesnt require you to spend very high amount of mana though as penalty is not very severe while when you do cast it it gives you immense tactical advantage over your opponent early. You can take on very difficult fights and win you can get hero to level 20 in under 15 turns. You also can have great military with it as it allows really rapid growth

[Flushing]

Escrito originalmente por Denam Pavel:

Escrito originalmente por Flushing:

The issue is, I rarely choose mana addicts over other society options in the astral line, such as mana channelers.

Some posters here are asking for a gentle nerf in order to save it from a more significant one, but it doesn't need a change as is.

You have to sacrifice your entire mana economy to use this or face penalties longwinded battles.

There are countless other ways to get HP back in combat suchs as regen, direct heals from other units, and or combat spells themselves.

On balance, I choose any one of those alternatives over mana addicts and take society traits that let me grow and scale armies quickly.

If OP found a particulary good strategy with it that's great. There are many such strategies in the game but that doesn't make it broken.

By turn 20, I will probably have two to three times the military size of someone who went mana addicts.

Mana addicts doesnt require you to spend very high amount of mana though as penalty is not very severe while when you do cast it it gives you immense tactical advantage over your opponent early. You can take on very difficult fights and win you can get hero to level 20 in under 15 turns. You also can have great military with it as it allows really rapid growth

Yes, but are saying that mana addicts is so good that it is akways 1 of 2 society traits you're choosing? That you're almost forced to choose it by default?

Because, that's not what I am doing, but I would if it were that game breaking.

[M0rgi]

Escrito originalmente por Flushing:

Escrito originalmente por Denam Pavel:

Mana addicts doesnt require you to spend very high amount of mana though as penalty is not very severe while when you do cast it it gives you immense tactical advantage over your opponent early. You can take on very difficult fights and win you can get hero to level 20 in under 15 turns. You also can have great military with it as it allows really rapid growth

Yes, but are saying that mana addicts is so good that it is akways 1 of 2 society traits you're choosing? That you're almost forced to choose it by default?

Because, that's not what I am doing, but I would if it were that game breaking.

I have been taking it in every build though as its just provides massive sustain that others dont which enables you to take fight after fight and be able to clear even some gold wonders by turn 10.

[Central]

Escrito originalmente por Flushing:

You have to sacrifice your entire mana economy to use this or face penalties longwinded battles.

not really, just pick a cheap t1 spell to cast and your done, some of them can be quite powerful for their cost to.
as long as you have a somewhat decent economy and a cheap spell to cast than there should be no problem what so ever.

[M0rgi]

Escrito originalmente por Central:

Escrito originalmente por Flushing:

You have to sacrifice your entire mana economy to use this or face penalties longwinded battles.

not really, just pick a cheap t1 spell to cast and your done, some of them can be quite powerful for their cost to.
as long as you have a somewhat decent economy and a cheap spell to cast than there should be no problem what so ever.

Fulmination is one amazing spell for it aoe damage with good chance of electrify. Its my favorite early spell especially because Ai loves to clump units together. Combine that with hero fire evocation and you have one very powerful combo

[DesertRose92]

Escrito originalmente por Flushing:

There are countless other ways to get HP back in combat suchs as regen, direct heals from other units, and or combat spells themselves.

On balance, I choose any one of those alternatives over mana addicts and take society traits that let me grow and scale armies quickly.

Maybe I have noticed it wrong, but Mana Addict seems to be give you HP back, not temporarily HPs, meaning it's very easy to leave a combat with more health than you entered it.

[M0rgi]

Escrito originalmente por DesertRose92:

Escrito originalmente por Flushing:

There are countless other ways to get HP back in combat suchs as regen, direct heals from other units, and or combat spells themselves.

On balance, I choose any one of those alternatives over mana addicts and take society traits that let me grow and scale armies quickly.

Maybe I have noticed it wrong, but Mana Addict seems to be give you HP back, not temporarily HPs, meaning it's very easy to leave a combat with more health than you entered it.

No its temporary hp like every other healing

[DesertRose92]

You sure?
I think if you have "full health" (actual HP + temporary HPs) it increases actual HPs instead.
Hard to test, will try tomorrow when I am home.

[President Jyrgunkarrd]

Triumph should fully just flex and straight-up buff Mana Addicts. Put the haters in their place & give us the plot twist on the nerf/buff internal arms race we all need.