E-Rose

Is there a way to change the default magic attack to Searer or Airshock? Prior to Mutagen this was easy to do, but both new titles seem to be missing this option. Unsure if there's any way for this feedback to reach Jeff - and consider this for a patch or next rework? The workaround is to bind attack spells to another shortcut, but still more cumbersome than allowing the option to chose a default attack.

Problem with Agents is creation level, they aren't that high as a Shaper's and they miss a lot because of the level difference, so you need to use them as disposable distractions/meathshields. Even if you focus on one shaping school, spending the points there is painful in early game and you sacrifice points that could be spent on mechanics/leadership or magic skills. Most of it comes down to level scaled hit chance. A shaper can have creations that are 5 or more level ahead and they hit 95% of the time. The shaper/agent/guardian is always a few levels behind and has a worse hit chance than a creation. On torment I often hit just 1 enemy out of 4 or 5 with Daze.. on occasion when I'm surrounded I'm the only target that gets Dazed 😅.

Oh yeah! What this means as an agent is you have to start combat before being visible to the enemy, send a squishy creation forwards, let the enemy chase it without getting the creation killed and group the enemy so that they can be hit with Daze or Terror. Works in open areas good enough, except when the enemy leaps and offs the creation, when Daze misses almost everyone 3 or 4 times in a row due to hit chance being driven by levels... or when the game forces you in enclosed spaces were this strategy doesn't work. And again, Shapers are better at it. Basically Torment as Agent is double tormenting 😅.

Putting a few extra points in a shaping school to increase creation hit chance will likely improve my build. It also shows a balance issue for the Agent, since he's supposed to focus on Magic/Battle.

There's a bunch of things that make the Agents weaker than Shaper in this game compared to previous titles. Chance to hit is only influenced by creature level, no other way to improve it. Shapers are better here because they can boost a creature's level to be way higher than the shaper himself. Agents can shape, but creatures are low level and miss a lot. Upgraded creatures get Area Attacks..far more damage per round compared to what the Agent can do before Airshock. The agent might miss and waste the round completely. An upgraded creature rarely misses even against tough enemies. Friendly fire + Enemy Leap + Unable to retreat. The agent can Daze himself when surrounded by enemies, basically a death sentence.

Agent playthrough. When getting surrounded by enemies (some not letting you escape) the only way out is crowd control. The problem is that the Agent can get Dazed by his own spell and miss most of the enemies, the outcome is a reload. Hit chance is governed by player/creature level. Why not give the player a mechanism to increase enemy hit chance and reduce probability of hitting friendlies via Mental/Combat Magic points or some other stat? Arguably you shouldn't be able to Daze yourself at all.

Until Airshock(late game) and Essence Lances(mid, but doesn't work very well) the only way to handle groups of melee + ranged enemies is to hope for daze to hit and abuse crystals (and I really mean hope because of the hit chance scaling only with levels...). Stealth is another option but not usable in most situations and not very satisfying. All this doesn't make for an enjoyable experience on higher difficulties. I feel like I'm complaining too much though 😅. The game works fine with any class if I switch to Normal instead of Torment, and I get to find the story of the first Geneforge, couldn't play the original due to clumsy engine and inventory management being a bit too messy.

Thanks Alhoon! I know how to change some of these scripts. Been playing Jeff's games since I tried the Geneforge 3 demo from a gaming magazine CD... probably 15 years ago or so 😅. I even had some few hundred posts on these boards, unsure what happened to them. I wasn't aware of the cr_bonus_aps setting, thanks! Using it makes for an interesting gameplay change, and it doesn't look like I'm breaking the game yet or feeling too much like cheating... some critters are still killing me but at least the agent can manage to reliable heal and cast one attack spell per 'round'. It doesn't feel as natural as the extra AP you could get in past games from Speed, but I think it is an improvement over base game as an agent. On to my point of the agent being weaker, if Daze fails to hit against mixed enemy groups with battle creations/serviles/scholai then the battle is lost. Once they close in they prevent the agent from retreating a few hexes back and you are swarmed by masses of new enemies. Leap is very dangerous because enemies close in too fast and the engine prevents strategic retreat a few hexes back. The fact that hit chance is level based without any input from mental magic points is another huge nerf for agents, it forces them to grind low level zones to level up before trying harder enemies...this wasn't a problem with previous games. With the new abilities that creations get, the other two classes really need some love in future games to make them fun to play. Agility should play a role in escaping from melee creation that are closing in, skills/spells for leap, extra AP as a skill or un-nerfed single target haste should work fine without being game-breaking. I think this game was balanced for shapers and it shows, those are fun to play all the way.

Is it possible to assign special abilities such as Leap or Perma Haste/Extra action points like some creations have to the main characters? The Guardian and Agent chars are now obviously inferior to the Shaper due to the new special abilities assignable to creations. An agent during mid and early-late game has nothing that can compare to the mass acid attacks that upgraded Artilla have or the area of effect attacks coming from the fire shaping creations. Guardians get a pass because they are moderately good at shaping and more health, but they would still benefit from leap/charge attacks like the Scholai.. On Action Points, haven't finished the game but I had a look in the scripts, there aren't any item giving extra action points like in the previous games, how do some of the enemies get extra attacks per round(it seems they actually get 2 full turns to me), and is it possible to script an agent to do the same?

Weird UI/UX choice, it should have been left up to the player to decide...what is the point of a default you can't change? In the previous Geneforges you could assign a different spell as the default one.. In mid-late portions of the game this becomes a bit annoying (maybe more so in my case because I'm playing an agent char on a laptop without physical click buttons or mouse, and would prefer setting Searer as the default instead of doing an extra click).

Is there a way to change the default spell? Firebolt is getting weak and making an extra click to choose Searer is irksome. Btw, for future games it would be interesting to get special abilities like Leap for the warrior/guardian classes...maybe even agents.

this champ looks like Napoleon: http://spidweb.com/images/avadon/AvInventory.jpg