New spell effects

Talk about the mods you'd like to see in Daggerfall Unity. Give mod creators some ideas!
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Jay_H
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New spell effects

Post by Jay_H »

Once again robbing from Discord, there are more effects that could be implemented to make DF's spell schools more usable. Illusion, as it stands, is completely broken: Invisibility is far too powerful for too little cost. Therefore, Invisibility would need to increase in spell cost, and let other spells have lower costs.

I don't think Destruction or Restoration need content since they're the most used and most purposeful spell schools, so I don't include them here. Suggestions welcome, though.

ALTERATION
Detect Living
Detect Dead
Gravity Toss: non-damaging spell that throws enemy backward, including off heights
Anchor: holds enemy in place for duration of spell. Enemy can still attack, fire arrows, and cast spells.
Living Armor: During spell's duration, gain +1 resistance to physical damage for every hit received. Re-casting the spell resets the resistance counter.
Frenzy: During the spell's duration, gain 1% quicker attack speed for every successful strike on an enemy. Re-casting the spell resets the speed counter.
Combat Regeneration: During spell's duration, gain +1 health regeneration per magic round for every hit received. Re-casting the spell resets the regeneration counter.
Reflect Damage: Returns 50% of all damage infliced on PC to its attacker during the spell's duration.
Hungry Blade: Heals PC for 10% of damage inflicted with weapons during its duration. Stacks with other lifesteal effects.
Silver Alloy: Any weapon does 2x damage to werewolves and wereboars during its duration.

ILLUSION
Invisibility to Undead
Tame Animal: Enslave a target animal for the spell's duration, causing it to follow and fight for you.
Enslave Undead: Enslave a target undead creature, causing it to follow and fight for you.
Camouflage: Maintains invisibility effect while PC does not move. Archery, fighting, and spellcasting do not break effect.
it would be nice if you could make a clone of yourself like the holo-duke
Bedlam: Affected enemy will randomly target any enemy nearby for its duration.

MYSTICISM
Leaguestep: combat spell, used to teleport 10 meters in a random direction (onto ground on the same elevation)
Conveyance: Teleports to a random point anywhere in the loaded interior. Can be used in dungeons, houses, palaces, etc.
Teleportation: Instant teleportation to any location in the current region. Very high magicka cost, perhaps other side effects. Outdoors only.
Sanctuary: Teleports to outside of the current location (essentially, trans_out console command). Useful for when you forget to set a Recall anchor.
Soul Release: Cast this spell and use an occupied Soul Gem to release the monster inside, enslaving it to follow and fight for you for the spell's duration.

THAUMATURGY:
Slowing Field: An area in front of the caster gains a slowing effect, reducing enemy movement through it by (spellpower)%.
Barrier: An area in front of the caster becomes impassable during the duration.
Feedback: Targeted spell, enemy spellcaster suffers damage of (magicka)/4 for every spell cast during its duration.
Dragging Steps: Gradually reduce the enemy's movement speed to 0, at which it will remain for the spell's duration.
Transmute Poison: If the PC is poisoned, any damage that the poison would cause is healed instead during the duration.

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Dubiousintent
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Re: New spell effects

Post by Dubiousintent »

Suggest a "Push Back" spell (Thaumaturgy or Alteration) that moves everyone in the area around the caster back X number of feet, but at least sufficient to get them out of immediate melee range. The Magnitude value be used to determine more than the minimum distance. Duration also seems appropriate to keep people at the distance only for a limited time but more than just a single "shove".

Edit - An "aura" spell: a variant on "area around caster" where a duration greater than one causes the spell to "pulse" each round, effectively recasting it and targeting new enemies within the current range.

meritamas
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Re: New spell effects

Post by meritamas »

I am planning to add some spell effects at some time in the future. Will be working on it in this thread.
I know the topic is a mess, but it might come to life again if I can get to it. Added link here so I won't forget to check these suggestions.

A little more specifically, I am quite into the Harry Potter universe and maybe collecting some inspiration from other universes and other TES games as well.

About some of the ideas so far:
Silver Alloy - Makes some sense to magically enable a weapon to damage werecreatures but would also consider every other case similarly where ability to damage is contingent on weapon material.
Anchor - makes sense and seems relatively easily implementable.
Gravity Toss - makes sense but cannot currently see how it could be implemented. Like: what does 'backward' mean.
Detect Living, Detect Dead - makes sense but currently can't determine if I'd be able to implement it.
---- henceforth no idea whether and how I could implement it, but prefer to comment anyway
Invisibility to Undead - could make sense - would not hurt to think up some lore about how undead creatures detect you and how you can fool them by magic. Perhaps more of a mysticism spell.
Tame Animal, Enslave Undead - could look at it as a simplified ersion of the Imperius idea, without needing to go into the fuss about how to control them - give them instructions. Could consider Daedra, Humanoids, NPCs as targets, too.
Bedlam - generally, when a spell effect messes with the will of the target, there should be a constraint. The spell should be useable by enemies, too and entities with high willpower should be harder to subvert.
Leaguestep: could consider making it so you can choose where to reappear (perhaps for a higher magicka cost)
Teleportation - I was already consiering something of the like. Don't see why it should be constrained to the current region. The spell should take you high (random height) above the ground level, then you should slow-fall down. Perhaps a risky version that could sometimes teleport you into the earth where you can't move and eventually drown if you can't teleport out.
Sanctuary: about recall anchors. I think you should ba able to have several anchors, the number could be contingent on mysticism skill and intelligence.

Theoretically it is possible to add new magic effects, also to replace current ones with a new implementation, so a lot should be possible.

Cheers!
Interest in expanding and improving the Magic system, Capitalism and an Unleveled World.

My main quest in the DFU community is my (Mostly) Magic Mod.

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Jay_H
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Re: New spell effects

Post by Jay_H »

meritamas wrote: Wed Feb 19, 2020 6:15 pm Gravity Toss - makes sense but cannot currently see how it could be implemented. Like: what does 'backward' mean.
It would just replicate the current knockback mechanic in melee combat, but now as a spell and doing no damage. The ability to use it melee or at range opens some flexibility, or area at range too.

Looking forward to what you can do with spell effects! :)

meritamas
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Re: New spell effects

Post by meritamas »

Jay_H wrote: Wed Feb 19, 2020 7:16 pm
meritamas wrote: Wed Feb 19, 2020 6:15 pm Gravity Toss - makes sense but cannot currently see how it could be implemented. Like: what does 'backward' mean.
It would just replicate the current knockback mechanic in melee combat, but now as a spell and doing no damage. The ability to use it melee or at range opens some flexibility, or area at range too.

Looking forward to what you can do with spell effects! :)
Thanks for the explanation. If the mechanic is already implemented, it definitely makes things a lot easier.
Well, I think I will make an attempt at creating a decent Magic Mod at some time in the future, but it will be quite a long way into the future. In no case should anybody wait for me :)
Interest in expanding and improving the Magic system, Capitalism and an Unleveled World.

My main quest in the DFU community is my (Mostly) Magic Mod.

meritamas
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Re: New spell effects

Post by meritamas »

Jay_H wrote: Wed Feb 12, 2020 11:06 pm Once again robbing from Discord, there are more effects that could be implemented to make DF's spell schools more usable. Illusion, as it stands, is completely broken: Invisibility is far too powerful for too little cost. Therefore, Invisibility would need to increase in spell cost, and let other spells have lower costs.

I don't think Destruction or Restoration need content since they're the most used and most purposeful spell schools, so I don't include them here. Suggestions welcome, though.
I've been giving these ideas some more thinking. He's a few thoughts.

Note: I haven't had time to actually play DFU as much as I would've liked to. So I am quite short on first-hand experience. This can of course, be countered easily: more experienced players just need to weigh in and tell me if I am saying something stupid.

I am a big fan of the idea of expanding, improving the magic system. But I would like any change to be well thought-through.. the game world consistent.

I'd begin by looking at the definition of the magic schools and decide the placement of effects into schools based on that.
I would also reconsider reassigning spell effects already there because in some cases they just don't fit the definition of the school. The original designers most have put some things where they put them to better balance the schools but if we are to be adding new effects, we could also do some rebalancing and while at it, ensure that the effects get into the school they fit best.

A good example would be 'Slowfalling' - I think this one belongs more in thaumaturgy. It could also be alteration, if we imagine that the spell works by removing mass. If we imagine it to work by changing how gravity affects that object, it belongs in Thaumaturgy.
Another would be 'Charm' - arguably a better fit in Illusion.

A couple of more concrete ideas
ALTERATION:
This school concerns itself with magicka's ability to change, often radically, the structure and composition of any object. Unlike the school of Illusion, Alteration deals with actual change, not the appearance of it. Slowfalling and Shield are two classic spells of the school of Alteration.
To me, it sounds an awful lot like if we were to add the ability of the player to enchant artifacts himself, this is the skill where it would fit best. (Provided we don't want to apprppriate one of the existing skills for this purpose. Provided the amount of fuss it could take to reappropriate a skill, presently I am more inclined to use ALTERATION.)
Also: the ability of the PC to repair (magical) artifacts could be contingent on his alteration skill. (Why can't you repair a piece of equipment by magic? This could also be a good feature of this school.)

Altogether, I am not satisfied with the way enchanting works in the game, so given time, I'd try and remedy this by a mod. With such a feature, the alteration skill would be strong enough to enable the reassigning of a few effects away from the school and still leave it attractive.
DESTRUCTION
This school is concerned with the purely destructive capabilities of magicka, evident in spells like Fireball and Ice Storm.
Perhaps, magical damage to equipment/armor.
ILLUSION
This school works with magicka in its capacity to camouflage, illuminate, or obscure without changing an object's structure. Invisibility and Light are two of the school's most basic spells.
Detecting spells belong here, I think.
I've changed my mind about mind-confusing spells like the Bedlam effect proposed higher. They could go in Illusion.
They fit here too if we imagine their working in a way that makes the target perceive things which would induce it to act in accordance with the spell effect.
Could imagine several different things you could make your target do. Make it fight for you, one. Randomly attack, another. Disarm itself and approach the caster, yet another. Flee the caster etc...

These should also work on the PC and there should be some rare enemies that are able to cast these spells. If such spell effect prevails, the player should lose control of the PC and should be reduced to a spectator for the duration of the spell and during which time his character would carry out the effect of the spell. Presently I cannot judge how much more complicated this would be to implement in comparison to the paralysis effect which also hinders the player in certain aspects of control.

There also should be a way to 'resist' these effects apart from the usual magic resistance mechanic. Enemies could resist them in that way too. What that mechanic should be: an interesting question. One could assume those skilled in this school themselves would find it easier to see through an illusion themselves. Or, if we assume that these spells cause you to do the things they do by inducing a dream-like state, you could say skilled Mystics should be able to see through the veil. Or, if the spell induces an urge to do something, those with strong willpower should be more resistant. Interesting question, indeed.

MYSTICISM
This school experiments with the most arcane aspects of magicka and expanding these "accidents" into a useful if eclectic range of spells. Because the forces being manipulated by Mysticism are dangerous and unknown, the spell effects are purposefully specific. This is evident in spells like Far Silence and Soul Trap.
Enslave undead would be a better fit here. The way undead creatures are created and controlled resonates well with 'the most arcane aspects of magicka'. It should be reasonable to expect the kind of illusion that subverts living beings would not work on undead. Same goes for controlling daedra. These are more probably a function of sheer willpower and strength of magic rather than confusing the target - and if confusing, it should require more arcane magic to do this in comparison to doing it to mortals.
Quick thinking - slows down the simulation so the player'd have more time to assess the situation. Very useful in complex combat situations.
Might also consider conjuration/necromancy effects here.
RESTORATION
This school is devoted to the salubrious and soothing powers of magicka, evident in spells like Cure Poison and Troll's Blood.
THAUMATURGY
This school concentrates on exposing or manipulating known forces and objects within their natural laws. This is evident in spells like Levitate and Water Walking.
This is where I would put gravity toss and the magical movement of enemies (perhaps also of things). You could be able to summon (cause to move toward you), toss away, perhaps toss to the left/right and reverse gravity (cause to gain altitude).
This latter could be an effective way of getting rid of enemies. Just make it rise and rise, then it falls and is destroyed.
Another good thing would be to force the enemy simply out of your way with these spells as you approach your target.
Assuming these effects work by influencing physics, ghost and other bodyless entities should be immune.

Another usefull effect would be fast flight. Wondering how high the simulation allows you to fly in the game... I could imagine casting a spell and rising and traveling this way with the speed of an airplane. The spell should be hard to get, hard to master, but extremely useful and/or fun in the right circumstances.

Buying, creating, and casting spells of XXX are less expensive for mages skilled in this path.
Overall, I am not satisfied with this mechanic either. You shouldn't be able to 'buy' spells. I think you should be able to learn spells. Then, after learning a given effect, provided you are intelligent and skilled enough, you should be able to create other spells with that effect by yourself. At a minimum, it should take some time to learn one, perhaps have a limit on how many you can learn in a given period or other limits like you cannot learn a given spell if you are not sufficiently skilled, intelligent and/or lack a certain required amount of willpower.

Please excuse the off-topic parts. I'm planning to eventually put all this in my 'there could be more to magic' thread too and develop further there.
Interest in expanding and improving the Magic system, Capitalism and an Unleveled World.

My main quest in the DFU community is my (Mostly) Magic Mod.

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Ralzar
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Re: New spell effects

Post by Ralzar »

meritamas wrote: Thu Feb 27, 2020 11:44 am Overall, I am not satisfied with this mechanic either. You shouldn't be able to 'buy' spells. I think you should be able to learn spells. Then, after learning a given effect, provided you are intelligent and skilled enough, you should be able to create other spells with that effect by yourself. At a minimum, it should take some time to learn one, perhaps have a limit on how many you can learn in a given period or other limits like you cannot learn a given spell if you are not sufficiently skilled, intelligent and/or lack a certain required amount of willpower.
Small addition:

The Spellbook item is stupid. It's a D&D leftover that just messes things up.
First there's the whole inscribing vs learning "feel" that I think is wrong with the spellbook.
Secondly, you can lose your spellbook, which then causes you to be unable to cast spells. Which of itself is fine I suppose, but then you have the problem that abilites like Lycantrophys "Shapeshift" and the Vampire abilites are spells. So if you don't have a spellbook, you can't turn into a werewolf?

Regnier
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Re: New spell effects

Post by Regnier »

i wonder if Nighteye could be implemented.

Im sure light isnt a factor in stealth but it would be cool to run around in a (should be) pitch black dungeon, but only you can see. That could provide a needed variance between shadow, chameleon and invisibility. As of right now they are fairly similar imo.

If light was a factor: in heavy light you would need shadow form or invisibility to have a decent chance of being undetected. In heavy darkness chameleon would be a better option cause its effectiveness would be higher and it costs less(right?). Shadow form would be needed to run and fight while invisible, basically making shadow form the ultimate disappearing spell

I think there room to grow with magic for sure. Shuffling the spells around and adding missing ones. There are some spells that fall into 2 schools but they could have slightly different effects or effectiveness.

Maybe another spell could be ghost. This makes you impervious but also unable to do damage/cast spells but you can pass through walls? theres lots of inspiration lol

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Jay_H
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Re: New spell effects

Post by Jay_H »

Just storing up a few more ideas (unintentionally bumping this very old topic).

"Enchant Weapon:" A basic Alteration spell. It could come in Silver (lowest cost, most basic), Elven, Dwarven, and Mithril. Magnitude could be how many swings you get before the spell runs out. The idea is that you gain the material bonus for that weapon temporarily, allowing you to hit enemies you otherwise wouldn't be able to. This includes the accuracy bonus in each material.

Chain spells: (originated from Magicono) A series of spells that do more when more enemies are present. One example is a spell that temporarily drains 10 speed from the first enemy it hits, then 20 from the next, 30 from the next, and so on. Or absorbs Fatigue, or steals Strength, or stuns them for X+1 seconds, or any other thing.

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Magicono43
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Re: New spell effects

Post by Magicono43 »

I'll just keep it short, because I think the idea is fairly intuitive if you played other games.

Chain-lighting, or at least some effect that chains to multiple nearby enemies originating from where either the spell hits or who the spell hits then to some set distance within that range to the next and so on. Basically like how the Chain-lighting spell works from Warcraft 3.

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