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RimWorld >  Workshop > Torann's Workshop > A RimWorld of Magic > Discussions
A RimWorld of Magic
Description Discussions401 Comments6996 Change Notes
Wolfguarde Nov 17, 2018 @ 12:51am
A few ideas for future development
I've been using the mod for at least a couple of releases now (I think I first subbed back in A17), and I love it. You're one of the only mod creators who's made an effort to balance their content, and I think the more recent additions (the rings, specifically) are an excellent addition for that purpose. There's a few tweaks and ideas I'd like to float that I think would further improve the mod:

- A right click toggle for auto-levelling a desired skill when the mage/fighter levels up. I'm primarily thinking of the 50-point sink, which presumably usually gets done once everything else has been levelled. But an option to set your desired skill to level also be useful in early game to cut down on micromanagement a bit.

- A gather point for mentoring magic and skills. Often I find that the autocast for this doesn't find a target; a dedicated work order/restrict type/gather spot might help to ensure regular mentoring takes place if the player's got it set to cast automatically.

- Enchanted furniture. Things like dream/memory transfer (passive mentoring) or mana regeneration via beds, walls that slow hostile pawns within a certain radius, materials that self-repair when magic-bearing entities are near... lots of possibilities here. Magic-based recreation/artistic stuff would be interesting too.

- Blood mage. A mage class that doesn't use mana, but draws their casting energy from freshly killed corpses. Spells would focus on the manipulation of blood - in and out of the body - and could include passives similar to the psionic. Blood magi could boil the blood within an individual to damage or down them, or chill the blood of pawns in an area to slow them and impact their manipulation. The ultimate could be a fast-acting induced hemorrhage that causes targets affected by it to bleed from the face and orifices, giving negative mood debuffs to surrounding pawns and weakening the afflicted with blood loss.

- Magical beasts. Common and uncommon alike would hold a lot of interesting potential. You could have wandering minibosses with similar rarity to thrumbos and strong passive/active magic (or fighting) abilities, along with more common beasts for hazards or quality of life improvements. Small animals that leech mana when they attack could be bred and trained for combat. Lumbering monstrosities that create localised elemental hazards could serve as killbox counters. Lightning minibosses could disable nearby electronics; fire could simply start fires around or behind itself as it moves, and stack burns on pawns within a certain radius of it. Ice could freeze the ground it walks on, or bring snow while on the map. An undead miniboss could resurrect corpses it approaches, turning graveyards into potentially deadly leverage.

You could also go for full-blown boss encounters if you choose to take this route, as a lategame challenge for colonies with developed casters/fighters.

- Wandering Necromancer/s. Event in which one or more necromancers enter the map to raise corpses. This could either be a neutral event, or a raid, with multiple necromancers entering the map with a large undead army.

- Mana crystals. A potential fuel source/consumable that could be added to random generation as an uncommon/rare ore type, for the creation of mana potions or advanced magical technology.

This is what I've got off the top of my head, hopefully some of it strikes your fancy.
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Showing 1-15 of 23 comments
Torann  [developer] Nov 17, 2018 @ 10:44pm 
@Wolfguarde
Honestly a lot of really good idea's

Enchanted furniture is on it's way and will, hopefully, add some useful and unique functionality that will expand on colony devlopment through magical means.

Also on the way are some new and dangerous challenges, one of which is definitely something along the lines of an undead army, and I've had a story-like challenge in design for quite some time that I want to add soon.

Paracytic Chrysalis is a new plant that will be added in the next update and is a slow growing plant that produces small quantities of magicyte. Manaweave is also out and will be completely implemented in the next patch. I'll evaluate the need for a special type of ore/metal in the future.

The blood mage is the next class and will come in the next few weeks. They'll be able to do some stuff on mana alone, but their real power will be through blood either by sacrificing their own blood or the blood of allies or using the blood of their enemies to fuel their most powerful abilities. No pain, no gain!
#1
Wolfguarde Nov 17, 2018 @ 10:51pm 
Nice, glad to hear it! This mod's got an amazing amount of potential, and I'm looking forward to seeing it grow.

On the topic of magicyte, is it viable to have it be a byproduct of deep drill mining as well as conventional mining? On flat maps, there's a lot more valuable material underfoot than there is on the surface, and while it's not sustainable in the extreme long term, it takes a fair while to clear even a medium a map of dig sites.
#2
Torann  [developer] Nov 18, 2018 @ 6:50am 
I'll consider it!
#3
Regularity Nov 18, 2018 @ 11:17am 
Might as well turn this into a general suggestions thread. To take a page from the comment that got burried:


Can you increase the range of the Bard's Battle Hymn buff?

Standard military practice has been to try and avoid packing many soldiers into one small location, in order to avoid a well-placed explosion wiping them all out. Hence the term "combat spacing".

The very limited rage of the Bard's Battle Hymn really hurts attempts to do this, since it only goes up to 17 meters at max level. While that sounds like a lot (especially in vanilla, where grenades only reach 3m or so), with mods that add large explosives (or far-reaching AoE spells, like this very mod), far more spacing is necessary. Additionally, the limited range means the Bard has to sit right in front line combat, and not towards the rear in a support role.

I'd recommend upping the range to at least 30 meters, so troops can take full advantage of natural cover and spacing, and so the Bard has leeway to hang towards the back in a support position. Possibly as high as 50 meters if you want to cover an entire base.

Also, the Succubus' -50/+50 relationship modifier with females/males is really extreme. That's degree of hate is on the scale of crimes against humanity (cannibalism, I-killed-your-love-and-poo'd-on-the-corpse, etc). I'd tone down the hate from -50 to somewhere between -10 and -20. I know it seems low, but also consider their colony destabilizing effect (cheating, breakups) on top of that.
#4
Wolfguarde Nov 18, 2018 @ 11:53am 
I actually like that part of the succubus' setup, I feel it fits with what they are (demonkin, manipulative, and unnaturally atractive). +/-50 is extreme, though, I agree with that. I wouldn't want to see it brought down much, though.

On the topic of succubi and buried comments, another poster mentioned not too long ago the incongruency in the succubus' general skillset and her ultimate. Succubi play very much like a ranged class, but their ultimate feels more tuned to melee... once you get to archotech/power armour-level defensive capacity it doesn't make a whole lot of difference what you have your pawns using, but as melee they really fall short compared to other classes, especially paladins.

That said, I'd honestly not be sure how to tweak it... though just having flight in and of itself would be a useful ultimate. Perhaps a transformation-style ability, with a time-based reversion? Or something akin to the lich transformation, where a full-on demonic metamorphosis is triggered with the ultimate, granting increased power and more skills but permanently penalising the pawn as well?
#5
Torann  [developer] Nov 18, 2018 @ 12:22pm 
I'll have to think about it. It's already a pretty devistating attack and, if you're playing with a full deck, you can just travel back to your soul bond immediately after you land...
Maybe she can spawn some weak "hate vespers" or something to draw attacks, or include a minor stun.
#6
Regularity Nov 18, 2018 @ 1:17pm 
Wait, isn't the Succubus supposed to be a melee class, not a ranged class?

Their soulbound + vitality drain grants up to +50% manipulation, which benefits melee and not shooting accuracy. Their Scorn ability is also a melee-centric ability since it encourages placing the pawn in the center of the battle. And Attraction is... well, it helps both melee and AoE attacks, but isn't really useful for ranged shooting beyond the general-purpose debuff.

The two things that prevent the Succubus from being a melee specialist are:
1) shadowbolt: blocked by your own shields, so you have to never use it if you ever want to equip melee shields. It functionally becomes an empty/unused ability slot for the class in that case.
2) attraction's friendly fire: it would be awesome for pulling shooters into melee range, if not for the big debuff you also suffer if you enter the field, greatly reducing your melee dps.

But yeah, I agree the Succubus doesn't have a clearly defined specializaiton in combat, beyond being a supporter (casing attraction to pin down mobs for everyone else to cast AoEs on).
Last edited by Regularity; Nov 18, 2018 @ 1:19pm
#7
Wolfguarde Nov 18, 2018 @ 10:09pm 
I thought manipulation affected any kind of action requiring hand-eye co-ordination :S So far as I knew shooters needed it too lol.

I actually use attraction for the most part to either set up mage bombardment as you've covered, or as a means to lock everyone in place for my paladins. Three high-level arcotech paladins decked out with shield belts, power armour and fast-hitting melee weapons can do amazing and terrible things to a field full of people who can't leave melee range XD

It's also a really good counter to poison/psychic ships once you hit lategame with a larger colony, as the sheer number of mechanoids you get spilling out of that relatively small piece of spacecraft can be overwhelming.

I actually hadn't factored shadow step into melee combat at all to be honest... that makes Scorn a lot more viable, now that you've mentioned it, Torann. The main issue I'd raise with that in mind is Attraction still affecting the Succubus, or Succubi in general. Granted, shadow step/call are pretty much instant casts, but your unit still winds up affected by the slow, and that combined with the concentration interrupts most casters get from taking damage can make it difficult to get out. But then again, I haven't actually done a lot of testing with a Succubus in melee, so I might have to play with that a bit more to give more useful feedback.
#8
Pimpmaster Bob Dec 17, 2018 @ 12:13pm 
I'm thinking of rolling a low-tech magic game, and a thought occured to me.

A researched (maybe 1000 points) 'Arcane Bazaar" portal or the like (constructed). Functions identically to the Comms console, with "Bazaar Anchors" constructed with 50 Magicyte and 10 steel and using no power. The anchors substitute for the Orbital Trade Beacon to define tradeable inventory. This would allow low-tech/no-tech games to have access to more trade options.

Add an advanced research for "Enchanted Trade Beacons" that will serve both the Bazaar and the Comms Console, and requires microelectronics be learned. Enchanted beacons require, in addition to the 40 steel and 1 component, also needs the 50 magicyte and 5 Jade to tie it all together. The benefit is that you only need to dedicate one space to the beacon, and they use no power (yay magic!)

If you have both the Comm Console and the Bazaar constructed, you'll get twice the numbr of tradeships.
#9
Wolfguarde Dec 17, 2018 @ 9:20pm 
^ I like this, but I would add the caveat that the arcane bazaar's traders would be limited to magic-item-specific traders. Makes more sense that way, at least to me.
#10
Pimpmaster Bob Dec 18, 2018 @ 3:59pm 
I guess I could see the demons and the vendors of the arcane also trading in minerals (gold, steel, and granite is universal after all) and maybe food, fabrics and even creatures/pawns. I vaguely remember an Orson Scott Card book as a kid that had a demon bazaar that the main characters visited that sold most everything you could want. I also picture Hellboy 2.

I think the big restriction would need to be nothing high-tech, or at least by default (a config option could enable a full catalog of items, I suppose).

Would just be a neat way to generate more trade options for lowtech games, as well as increase occurances for high-tech ones.

The portal could also be away to contact other factions like the comm sensor, or at least magic factions.
Last edited by Pimpmaster Bob; Dec 18, 2018 @ 3:59pm
#11
Wolfguarde Dec 18, 2018 @ 9:33pm 
True, and I suppose it really boils down to whether authenticity should get in the way of fun/ease of play. There's nothing necessarily wrong with having a magical equivalent to the trade beacon, of course. Though I think that if it's in, there should be something that sets it apart from the technological one in terms of function.
#12
Omega13 Dec 19, 2018 @ 7:10pm 
So I have messed around with this mod a lot and was thinking about some things. In particular, I was thinking about how rarely I actually craft the items in it. Beyond scripts and books to make new casters, I rarely craft the wands, hoods, cloaks, and whatnot. I feel this may be, in part, because the wand relies too heavily on magicyte as a resource. I'm always saving it for the BIG items so I never get to enjoy the small items. Consider how the base game addresses similar issues - plasteel and steel are separated into two distinct tiers of resources. You never find yourself saying "Well I can't build a generator because I need to save up to build plasteel turrets" or whatever. These resources are distinctly separated so items of both tiers can be created and deployed separately. Anyway, though it would probably be a lot of work at this point, I was thinking that maybe it might be interesting if there was a separate magical resource for "lesser" items such as wands and clothing while the magicyte was reserved for items that create new spells and casters - since that's what I (and others I've talked to who use the mod) end up hoarding it for anyway.
#13
Pimpmaster Bob Dec 19, 2018 @ 7:49pm 
Omega13: Perhaps a way to refine magicyte from steel/wood/other natural elements would address the rarity concern? Also helpful if you are on a play where farming from the plants isn't a real option either.

New Research: Construction: Arcane Refinery. Contains various bills too pull magicyte from different items. Obviously more-expensive items (jade, plasteel, uranium) result in higher yields compared to wood, steel or rocks. Refinery is powered by mana, similar to the forge.
#14
Wolfguarde Dec 19, 2018 @ 9:51pm 
Both good ideas. I think personally increasing the availability of magicyte is the way to go for the solution (I like that we can grow it now, for example), and I'd like to see some kind of deconstruction mechanism for arcane items that aren't needed, in order to break them back down to base materials with a fixed percentage loss (say, 10-15%).

Another way - though it would be a lot of work to implement - might be to give us the ability to enter rifts during elemental assaults and raid them for supplies such as magicyte. A simpler solution might be adding a cache event in which areas rich in natural magicyte, or with stashes of mined magicyte, pop up as events in a similar way to the current item fetch events we get from other factions.
#15
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