Firstly Ents...
Much as I love the superstealth in forests, it is not consistent. I've had situations where the whole visible screen has been eaten away by gnawing bugs, but I'm still hidden even though I stand out like a sore thumb! Also if you are getting meleed by a hidden character you'd still know about it! On the other hand if an Ent walks into a patch of trees anywhere else, then he is not hidden when you'd think he should be.
I know this would be a bit of a change, but how about setting superstealth whenever an Ent walks on to a tree grid (anywhere) and then unsetting it whenever they leave the grid or attack a monster (I think this mirrors the change you have made to the speed boost for Elvish rangers/druids)? You would also want monsters to walk into tree grids when an Entish player is hidden as if they're trying to find him (you wouldn't want an Ent to be able to hide when there is only one tree grid in sight...).
The complication here is of course Entish rogues and assassins who can also cast the superstealth spell. You don't want to cancel the spell if he walks through a patch of trees.
and Druids...
I still don't really know what to make of them. Their early melee is rubbish and similarly the early offensive spells. Bare-handed melee skill increases dramatically through the game, though it doesn't seem to compare to using a good weapon - even with less hits due to substantially less skill.
A high level druid though is an awesome character. With beguiling and heighten magic, I even managed to slow Morgoth. Then with the ability to stun using thunderclap and create glyphs to melee from, it is not too difficult to take out any of the uniqes (providing you play carefully of course) despite having the 'weak' melee of a full caster.
This was my first attempt at meleeing with a caster, so it may just be the case that all casters get too high a melee skill - I certainly imagine that a priest would be even easier with his combat skill coupled with being able to create glyphs. However one solution would be to increase the mana cost of glyphs considerably, so they can't be simply recast on breakage (without a lot of !RestMana anyway). It would also be good to encourage druids to use barehanded over melee - perhaps a monster should save against stunning as well as confusion (most high level baddies cannot be confused so it would be nice to have something to hit them with).
I didn't find the new spells to be useful in their current form. Nature's vengeance does not do enough damage and the Song of Growth does not provide enough 'useful' growth (and is high level/high mana). As I mentioned elsewhere it would be useful to have growth at a low level, covering a surrounding radius (depending on clevel) in grass and creating trees at random intervals. This would be good for disrupting LoS. Then have Nature's Vengeance in a dungeon book doing some more serious damage.
Proofing is a good idea, but it isn't very user friendly yet. It doesn't tell you the reason you can't see your rods in the selection to be proofed is that you have a stack of three and you can only proof one at a time, so you need to drop the other two to be able to cast it (also at present if you pick up the rest then they stack and all become proofed anyway - though you've probably fixed that now). Is there anything against being able to proof a whole stack at a time anyway?
The other offensive spells have a big variance - for example x + randint(90 + plev * 4) - it would be nice to have a little more consistency. Also spells like tsunami should maybe push the monsters back as in a force effect - it would be more fitting with the "You hurl mighty waves at your foes!" message.
My thoughts are that Druids are tough to get going, but once you get to CL45 they are *very* powerful. With Ents currently being easy to get going - Entish Druids are a very strong combination if you can survive the midgame.
Hope that helps and is by no means meant to be critical as this is my favourite variant!
Cheers,
Si
Much as I love the superstealth in forests, it is not consistent. I've had situations where the whole visible screen has been eaten away by gnawing bugs, but I'm still hidden even though I stand out like a sore thumb! Also if you are getting meleed by a hidden character you'd still know about it! On the other hand if an Ent walks into a patch of trees anywhere else, then he is not hidden when you'd think he should be.
I know this would be a bit of a change, but how about setting superstealth whenever an Ent walks on to a tree grid (anywhere) and then unsetting it whenever they leave the grid or attack a monster (I think this mirrors the change you have made to the speed boost for Elvish rangers/druids)? You would also want monsters to walk into tree grids when an Entish player is hidden as if they're trying to find him (you wouldn't want an Ent to be able to hide when there is only one tree grid in sight...).
The complication here is of course Entish rogues and assassins who can also cast the superstealth spell. You don't want to cancel the spell if he walks through a patch of trees.
and Druids...
I still don't really know what to make of them. Their early melee is rubbish and similarly the early offensive spells. Bare-handed melee skill increases dramatically through the game, though it doesn't seem to compare to using a good weapon - even with less hits due to substantially less skill.
A high level druid though is an awesome character. With beguiling and heighten magic, I even managed to slow Morgoth. Then with the ability to stun using thunderclap and create glyphs to melee from, it is not too difficult to take out any of the uniqes (providing you play carefully of course) despite having the 'weak' melee of a full caster.
This was my first attempt at meleeing with a caster, so it may just be the case that all casters get too high a melee skill - I certainly imagine that a priest would be even easier with his combat skill coupled with being able to create glyphs. However one solution would be to increase the mana cost of glyphs considerably, so they can't be simply recast on breakage (without a lot of !RestMana anyway). It would also be good to encourage druids to use barehanded over melee - perhaps a monster should save against stunning as well as confusion (most high level baddies cannot be confused so it would be nice to have something to hit them with).
I didn't find the new spells to be useful in their current form. Nature's vengeance does not do enough damage and the Song of Growth does not provide enough 'useful' growth (and is high level/high mana). As I mentioned elsewhere it would be useful to have growth at a low level, covering a surrounding radius (depending on clevel) in grass and creating trees at random intervals. This would be good for disrupting LoS. Then have Nature's Vengeance in a dungeon book doing some more serious damage.
Proofing is a good idea, but it isn't very user friendly yet. It doesn't tell you the reason you can't see your rods in the selection to be proofed is that you have a stack of three and you can only proof one at a time, so you need to drop the other two to be able to cast it (also at present if you pick up the rest then they stack and all become proofed anyway - though you've probably fixed that now). Is there anything against being able to proof a whole stack at a time anyway?
The other offensive spells have a big variance - for example x + randint(90 + plev * 4) - it would be nice to have a little more consistency. Also spells like tsunami should maybe push the monsters back as in a force effect - it would be more fitting with the "You hurl mighty waves at your foes!" message.
My thoughts are that Druids are tough to get going, but once you get to CL45 they are *very* powerful. With Ents currently being easy to get going - Entish Druids are a very strong combination if you can survive the midgame.
Hope that helps and is by no means meant to be critical as this is my favourite variant!
Cheers,
Si
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