In case someone doesn't get it, this is Korax' Heritage: Scattered Evil... [img]images/smiles/icon_smile.gif[/img] Just hope that Korax SE will be less buggy than Win98 SE... [img]images/smiles/icon_razz.gif[/img] As already mentioned in the other post, I don't see any real reason to waste much time on patching up a mod that works fine in single player (and never will in multiplayer), IMO the main reason for a patch at all is that this way we can send out the news to Doomworld & co. once again, thus making our presence known still another time. This way, more people will hear about us. Since the GDC interview will go public somewhen this week, giving us good publicity (I hope), I'd say the patch will be ready when it's ready but we will release it only 10 days - 2 weeks after the GDC interview (marketing marketing). BTW getting out KMOD2 when it came out wasn't a stupid idea, download counter was 383 on Monday, 76 of it on RavenGames, that means about 20% of all KMOD2 downloads in December have been from the RavenGames Xmas event (where it still got the 2nd lowest download numbers, right after the Heretic II map). Current download number for both mods together just reached the 1000 somewhen this Monday, this is really good for such an old game IMO, especially for a mod with no new maps or artwork (well nearly zero). Anyway, to add something productive to this topic, here the first new spell idea, what about a "farm animal spell" for the mage, but this time somewhat different: You cast the spell and a random farm animal is summoned. It can be a little pig, an even smaller chicken, a somewhat larger lamb (gotta create the 2D pix from the Hexen II model), or a big freakin' bull... if you're lucky, you summon a big bull that smashes your enemies, if you're unlucky, you end up with a lamb that'll peacefully graze and never attack anything (or the in-between possibilities are a chicken that tries to peak your enemies to death with a full determination to help you and harm your foes, or a piglet that runs around and bites people at random, be it you or a monster). Another possibility would be that the spell changes when you learn more magical arts, like when you first learn the spell, you can summon only a useless lamb, later on a pig that might help you but might not, still later a chicken that always helps you but isn't really strong, and on a real high level you can learn the spell to perfection and get yourself a big freakin' bull that makes pulp of most foes. The 3rd possibility would be that you get the better forms only at the higher levels, but from the existing possibilities you summon a random one, i.e. if you know the spell on its 3rd level, you don't always summon a chicken, you might easily end up with a lamb or a pig. The chance for the better animal could be determined by a new attribute of the mage that would influence all spells, some kind of magical skillfulness, the more spells you cast / the more time you spend on learning spells, the better this attribute will get, and the higher the chance your spells will come out the way you want it (i.e. if this value is real low, your spells will backfire a lot, especially higher level spells; if this value is very high, you as good as always cast what you wanted).

While reading the 9-pages topic, I stumbled upon a spell idea from Ichor: <blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">quote

How about combining the Spirits Within and Summon spells to make, maybe an "Animate Dead" spell for the cleric. The cleric would point to a dead monster and activate the spell. The monster would be revived to fight with him as if he was summoned (with the slight chance that it will go wild and seek revenge on you for killing it). This way, you will have some control over what monster you use, and the more powerful the monster was, the more faith is required for the spell to be successful. Of course, certain extremely powerful monsters can't be revived unless the cleric was at least level 15-20 (Korax and probably the Heresiarches will, undoubtedly, be exempt) and like the Possession spell, you can only use this spell on one monster at a time.

Another spell idea, "slowing time" or whatever, it would make the game world move at a lower speed (monsters and if possible environment), thus giving you an edge in strategic movements (spell effects should be slower as well).

When I first started programming new spells into the game code, I tried doing a Time Stop spell using the Time Bomb artifact from Heretic, which stops everything for a short time (maybe 5-10 seconds). Monsters, projectiles, doors, etc. I couldn't decide then whether it was everything on the map, or just within a certain radius. Anyway, it didn't work out, since I knew very little about the code at the time. As for the slowdown spell, you could use it as a projectile, and if it hits a monster, it will slow down to half speed. Its attacks will decrease in frequency, and the speed of its shots (if any) will be cut in half. For more powerful monsters, it will be by a quarter (8 speed instead of 12), and for monsters like Korax, a 1/6 to 1/8 speed decrease. Also, it shouldn't be able to slow down a monster more than once at a time, until the effects wear off. Of course, you could give this spell to a monster, enabling it to use against you, like adding it to the list of spells the Heresiarch throws at you. You know, after thinking about this a bit, you could have all sorts of different bows with arrows of various enchantments. Arrows that do fire damage, ice damage, lightning damage, slows enemies down, poisonous arrows, causes fear in enemies (making them run away from you instead of chasing you), blinds enemies (like the Shadowsphere effect), vampiric arrows that sap energy away from them and give them to you, but does the opposite for undead, arrows that silence magic users like those Bishops), puts enemies to sleep, and maybe even exploding arrows. You could also make some spells to enchant weapons other players might use, like the fighter's axe or the cleric's mace. And the mage should have a melee weapon of his own he could enchant, like the staff from Heretic or Heretic 2. However, I think it should only affect nonmagical weapons. Magical weapons like the Serpent Staff or Arc of Death do enough damage as it is. [ January 17, 2002: Message edited by: Ichor ]</p>