I think its a good unit idea. I have graphical concerns, but I am in
favor of the unit.
Basic unit, for which I have not specified stats (they would make it
more expensive than other dwarves, more sturdy than a thunderer, and
about the same movement).
20-21 gold. Probably ~8-2 melee (remember its magic). I figure you can't
swing a hammer very quickly. If you want more strokes, 6-3 maybe.
Having a melee magic attack is not a new idea, AFAIK. The Shadow Mage
line has it. (that's not an official unit, but its used fairly often).
But that doesn't mean its not a good idea.
I would also like to suggest an aura for this unit. My idea is a
stoneskin aura, which would make all adjacent units subtract damage
from attacks dealt to them.
The level-2 smith would cause an aura which would reduce the damage of
all attacks by one.
Level-3 - two damage, level-4 - three damage.
This sounds rather complex. Why not give them the same specialty, but do
something like leadership - it is more effective for lower levels? Gives
~20% attack resistance to physical attacks per level difference. So at
fourth level, it give ~60% resistance to attacks... that might be too
powerful.
This should, perhaps be limited to pierce/blade/impact attacks, and
should not be able to reduce damage below 1 damage per strike.
I think the limitation to physical attacks is good, but it might be seen
as too complex. By reduce damage below 1 damage per strike, you mean it
cannot make them do 0 damage, right? That is i believe already done for
all damage-reducing effects (like resistance and bad time of day). Or do
you mean it cannot reduce damage by more than 1? That would be odd, and
I doubt its what you mean, but its how I read what you said at first.
The whole point of this is to make the dwarves (and by this, I mean
the dwarves alone, not the knalgans) more powerful, without
sacrificing their "dwarvenness".
It is very dwarvish, I'll give you that.
-turin
