Hello! Since Truper has problems posting to the mailing list because of the spam filter I'm relaying this message for him:
I have been having a lot of trouble recently with the whole concept of Arcane damage as it has been implemented in 1.3. Both the rationale for the damage type and its effects on gameplay seem questionable. As I understand the matter, the primary reason for the change was that Holy as a damge type was entirely directed against the Undead. I believe that it was felt that this was flawed from a design perspective, as it did not give the damage type sufficent reason to exist, and also from a multiplayer balance standpoint, as Holy attacks inflicted so much damage upon the Undead as to be unfair. A secondary reason appears to have been that there was objection to the word Holy itself, as bringing religion into Wesnoth. What may have been a tertiary reason for the change was the nature of Undead vs. Undead combat. I'm not sure this last was part of the justification for the move to Arcane, but since it was being actively discussed at the same time as Holy vs. Arcane, and the most obvious change in gameplay is that the Ghost's melee attack now does Arcane damage, I am going to treat it as a factor in the rationale. If it was felt that a damage type directed solely against one faction had insufficient reason to exist, I have to say that this seems to ignore the unique nature of Undead. The Undead are, well, dead, but yet somehow also animate, and malevolent. Their natures cannot be compared to those of other creatures. That which is especially effective against them should not be expected to be especially effective against anyone else. In gameplay terms, Undead have loads of resistances, and a unique immunity, the immunity to poison, so the fact that they had a unique vulnerability troubled me not at all. It must also be remembered that only 3 units in the game did Holy damage, and of these, one was level two, and the others were level three. Obviously the level threes were almost never seen in multiplayer, and the level two only rarely. This level two unit, the White Mage, is a level-up from the Mage, and there is also an alternative level-up, the Red Mage. For myself, I always found the choice between these to be interesting, even when fighting Undead, as the Red Mage is so much more robust than the White, and while not capable of inflicting the damage that a Holy White Mage did, was nonetheless an anti-Undead powerhouse. As far as mutiplayer balance went, I see no issue that could not have been dealt with more simply and cleanly by reducing most Undead's vulnerability to Holy from 100% to a more reasonable 50 or 60%. It seems to me obvious that Wesnoth is loosely based on medieval European society (among other things). Who can deny that religion, specifically Christianity, played an ovewhelmingly important role in the world of kings, castles, and knights? How then is it possible to object to the mere presense of the word holy? Whatever one's own stance on the place of God or religion in the modern world, the fact is that religion inseperable from the culture in which Wesnoth has its roots. To take this a bit further, it is also undeniable that in mythologies involving the undead, they are considered unholy abominations, from which religion can offer some defence. When the vampires come calling, the peasants run to the parish priest for protection. Vampires shy away from a cross. Undead can be dissolved by Holy Water. They cannot come onto consecrated ground. To deny that religion has been mythologically regarded as an antidote to the undead is a bit like denying dragons breathe fire, sleep on hoards of treasure, or eat maidens. Undead vs.Undead combat in Wesnoth has always been rather odd, since Undead are resistant to their own weapons. Typically in 1.2, such a matchup involves Skeletons, Skeleton Archers, and Walking Corpses attacking each other fairly ineffectually until someone gets lucky, or the players give up in frustration. Dark Adepts, Ghouls, Ghosts and Vampire Bats are generally not recruited at all. It seems to me that the situaion in 1.3 is actually worse, since there is very little incentive to use anything but Ghosts. Ghosts now do more damage to other Undead than any of their other units, while retaining their mobility advantage and their ability to heal realtively faster than anything else. Ghosts are also now among the very rare units in the game able to kill another of their own kind in a single combat. I find this odd, even bizarre. The only other (level one) units that can do this are the Horseman, the Ulfzerker, the Mage, and the Augur. The Horseman and Ulf are obviously exceptional due to the Charge and Berserk abilities, but I have a hard time understanding why Augurs and Mages can. An Augur at night can kill another Augur, but only because of the cold vulnerability. Why should a creature that is a master of cold magic be vulnerable to cold? To take an example from the way Arcane has been implemented, Elves are vulnerable to Arcane (not that I agree with this, more in a minute), except for the Sorceress line. The reason why can only be that Sorceresses wield Arcane magic, and are therefore somewhat protected against it. Analagously, it would make sense to me for Augurs to lose their cold vulnerability, and Mages to gain fire resistance. Getting back to the main topic, Ghosts being able to kill other Ghosts in one turn makes little sense to me from a gameplay perspective, and none at all from the perspective of mythological consistency, which leads me to the major objection I want to raise. One of the marks of a good fantasy novel is that it draws upon Faerie in ways which resonate with what is already known of that fabled land. It can deviate, or extrapolate, and it should, but not too jaringly or too far. If there are Dwarves in a story, they will almost certainly be short of stature but stout of build, strong, hardy, bearded, skilled at smithcraft and mining, etc. They may choose to live in cities or gardens rather than in mountains or caves, but if they do, they story had better explain why, and it should be necessary to the plot in some way, or the reader will feel mislead, and that he has not been transported to the real Faerie, but some poorly-manufactued imitation. I get that mislead feeling from Wesnoth 1.3, which I did not from earlier versions, which is the only thing which could have driven me to write this (perhaps unforgivably) long critique. To my mind, giving living creatures vulnerablity to Arcane damage equates them with the Undead, and this wholly breaks my expectations of what Undead are. They are not of Faerie, they are unnatural, animated by the foulest of magic, the stuff of nightmares. On the other hand, nothing is more natural than an Elf, at least to another Elf, and in many mythos, Elves are ther very embodiment of nature. They may be immoral, or thier morality may be incomprehensible to humans, but they are not horrifying seekers after living flesh, intending to rend and devour all that they can lay thier rotting hands upon. Even worse is giving Ghosts Arcane damage. If a house becomes haunted by ghosts, in what story or mythos is the effective thing to do to get some other ghosts to kill them? Giving Ghosts Arcane damage is a bit like giving Drakes vulnerability to Fire - it makes them contrary to their own nature. Another mark of good fantasy is that it is internally consistent. Not everything need work as it does in our world, nor could it, or it would not be fantasy at all. Nonetheless, a lack of consistancy gives the reader a sense that the author is just making it all up as he goes along, rather than reporting on the events of another world. If we take a look at the Elvish Sorceress' description, we find: "The world of faerie is far more potent than the corporeal world. Simply brining some of this world into our own can have violent results." If this is an explanation of the destructiveness of Faerie Fire, how is it that bringing a piece of Faerie into our world is especially destructive to creatures of Faerie? It could be argued from this that Elves should have the highest Arcane resistance of any units in the game, since Elves are the archetype of a Faerie creature, and could be expected to take little, if any, damage from bringing some of Faerie into our world. Thus I think Arcane damage fails the consistency test. Finally, we come to the units themselves, the chages to them, and their effects on gameplay. I've already mentioned how absurd I now find Ghost vs.Ghost combat, and what Ghosts having Arcane damage does to the Undead vs.Undeadures to justify taking the frailer branch?" Furthermore, and this is where things really begin to get sticky, White Mages are now less powerful when facing Loyalists, Outlaws or Knalgans, about the same when facing Elves, noticeably better against Drakes, and fantastically better against Woses, who were, as living creatures, 20% resistant to Holy, but are now, for some reason, 30% vulnerable to Arcane. Did anyone ever argue that White Mages were overpowered facing Loyalists, or underpowered facing Drakes (against whom, by the way, they were already more powerful than their Red Mage counterparts, due to the Drake's Fire resistance)? I doubt it. What seems to have happened is that it was thought: "Ok, we have this new damage type, Arcane, so we have to decide on resistances." A rather arbitrary scale of "Arcaneness" was then devised, on which Undead rank at the top, Drakes and Woses come next, etc. I suspect that Drakes were assigned a higher Arcane vulnerability than other creatures not because there is any justification for it in terms of Wesnoth's fantasy world, but because since Arcane damage replaces Cold damage in two instances, it was thought that since Drakes were already vulnerable to Cold, making them vulnerable to Arcane as well would throw the balance less out of whack than might otherwise have been the case. But Woses were formerly resistant to Cold, and are now vulnerable to Arcane. Doesn't all this just reek of unintended consequences? If one starts from the standpoint that balance in Wesnoth 1.2 was excellent, as I do, can the balance in 1.3 be anything but worse, since it is so different, and different in ways that are the result of the arbitrary propigation of an unneeded damage type through the game? I've already beaten the Ghost to death (pun intended), but I suppose I had better say a few words about the Sorceress and the Paladin. Sorceresses are still good against Drakes, but not so good as formerly, and noticeably worse against Loyalists, etc. They are now fully the equal of White Mages in combatting Undead, in a faction that already has access to the White Mage. Need it be said that Rebels have gained greatly in relation to the Undead? Again, was any of this necessary, or even intended? Paladins, to quote Websters Unabridged, are "any determined advocate or defender of a noble cause." Can it be said that the Drakes of Wesnoth are ignoble? The Elves? Why should a Paladin do extra damage against them? When the Paladin did Holy damage, and Holy damage was only especially effective against Undead, then the special virtues of Paladinhood were easy to understand. But now? The religious component comes in here as well. How else to explain the Paladin's special abilities, if they are not a boon bestowed by God, or the gods, on a knight of such nobility and honor that his righteousness dispells the undead, and heals the virtuous? Arcane damage as currently implemented violates KISS. It's easy to understand why a Heavy Infantry resists blade damage, or a Drake resists fire, but I, who have spent much effort trying to understand Arcane, cannot understand it. Holy damage and its effects were easy to understand. If your reply to this is: 'aren't we free to arbitrarily set the unit's damage types and resistances to anything we think produces good gameplay? After all, "if gameplay requires it, they can be made to live on Venus"', I say yes, but in that case they had damned well better be called Venusians, and not Undead, Elves, or anything else. Arcane is confusing, full of contradictions, and unnecessary. Roll it back. Richard J.Trup aka Truper _______________________________________________ Wesnoth-dev mailing list [email protected] https://mail.gna.org/listinfo/wesnoth-dev
