Design - Spell Rarity

Talk about the mods you'd like to see in Daggerfall Unity. Give mod creators some ideas!
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Sirellyn
Posts: 12
Joined: Sun Aug 25, 2019 6:28 pm

Design - Spell Rarity

Post by Sirellyn »

I don't have any development time right now. I do game design work so I'll write down the high level idea for this here. Maybe I'll get to it one day. Feel free to steal if you like.

Rare Spell Progression

Always hated how it's all open at once, no reward for finding new spells. Instead making finding new spells fun and exciting. Bring more back to alchemy as well.

General
  • Players don't begin with spells except one minor spell tied to a major skill you start with. No magic in majors means no starting spells.
  • Spells can drop with scrolls, but average of less than 1 scroll drop per dungeon. It will always be a spell you don't have and determined by your highest magic skills.
  • You (mostly) shouldn't find duplicates. Unless you have all the spells already.
  • You can Click "Use" a spell to burn up the scroll and produce the spell effect at a caster level 5x higher than your own. But if you don't have the spell learned yet, it will give you a "are you sure" dialog.
  • Many spells /spell effects gated by skill level in spell. (You won't find them until your skill is high enough. Quest exception below.)
  • (Bonus) Clean up the Spell book interface. Auto Color Sort by school and Casting chance.
Mage Guilds
  • Mage Guilds don't sell spells
  • Mage Guild spell maker only allows you to craft spell effects you have the spells to
  • This includes elemental effects. If you don't have a direct damage element known, you cannot make a spell with it.
  • This includes range effects. Your maximum range you can craft is that of the maximum spell range of your best spell
  • Include AoE as above
  • Includes Magnitude (Damage) as above
Quests
  • Mage Guild gives Quests for spells when you are high rank enough
  • These spells will be limited by guild rank and skill rank. Lower level spells will be available first. And player will either know what spell the quest is for, or have a strong hint.
  • Quests to get access to Enchant an Object (Clothing / Staves), then Weapon, then Armor, then all other items
  • Can only enchant with abilities from spells player already knows, with similar restrictions as spell maker above.
  • Mastery Quests to Break Spell Limits on Range, AoE, Magnitude etc. Each is it's own quest at max mage rank and one magic skill maxed.



Additionally, this makes potions finally useful. And mirrors finding new weapons per dungeon.

Ok kids arrived, sorry I can't format better.

nicksta1310
Posts: 126
Joined: Wed Nov 02, 2022 8:43 am
Location: Australia

Re: Design - Spell Rarity

Post by nicksta1310 »

I feel that this design goes too far the other way.

Potions are already useful for characters who are 'magic-impaired' (e.g. inability to regenerate spell points, miscellaneous magic skills, etc.) and those characters wouldn't join the Mages Guild anyway.

Restricting the most powerful Destruction spells to higher ranks would be good, but removing spell sales altogether would make the Recall spell unavailable, which would turn the classic dungeon crawling into a nightmare without installing additional mods. It would also punish character classes like the Healer for existing, because they need a variety of spells from day one to defend themselves.

Adding spell scrolls as a loot drop would raise the question of why nobody sells the scrolls, let alone why most of the enemies that drop them never use magic against you.

I like the idea of improving the spellbook interface, except that sorting by casting cost (i.e. the number of spell points required) would make more sense than sorting by chance of effect, because many spell effects don't have a variable chance value, but they all have a cost value.

Sirellyn
Posts: 12
Joined: Sun Aug 25, 2019 6:28 pm

Re: Design - Spell Rarity

Post by Sirellyn »

That's a good point about magic impairment (no spellpoint regen). I think it's the structure of Daggerfall being an "opt out" of magic for characters as opposed to "opt in". Part there is personal preference, and part is that it's not reflected in the game world that (mostly) everyone and their dog can cast magic spells. In most games potions are more universally useful, especially with crafting. I would like to bring that back a bit more to Daggerfall.

You have a good point about recall. There would have to be some sort of solution for that in this mod if it took that away.
I haven't had the same experience with the healer class as you have. Based on the default layout it would be more challenging to be sure.

Scrolls - The idea is they are rare. Similar to how magic items were treated in original AD&D. You really just don't find them in stores. And they are the hidden pride of mages, and they don't like sharing their secrets with others. As for other creatures casting them, they are meant to retain knowledge (which isn't done often) or being a last ditch (expensive) effort when they are cast.
Perhaps a final mage guild quest where you are taught how to craft a scroll and each one requires a rather involved quest.
In short, there's plenty of good reasons to understand the rarity of scrolls in the game.

Good catch on the casting chance for the spell book, I did mean spell cost, but I didn't write as such. You are absolutely right there.

All in all, thank you for the feedback.

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Jay_H
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Re: Design - Spell Rarity

Post by Jay_H »

Technically, this subforum is for mods that have some work done in them already; prospective ideas go in Mods General. I'll move this topic there for now, and if you work on this, I'll be happy to move it back :)

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