Lately, I've been playing around with "Ludmeister's Might and Magic 3 - Isles of Terra Monster Spawn Mod". Without knowing anything about this mod any further than what the readme tells, my intended party was:
- H-Orc Barbarian
- Dwarf Ninja
- Elf Samurai (Archer "re-cast")
- Elf Samurai
- Elf Samurai
- Human
Cleric Priest
Since the readme states that "a couple of other classes are renamed, but otherwise are unchanged", I wasn't expecting (well, not really) any surprises.
So, next I kicked the Dwarf Ninja because of really low HP and replaced it with a Gnome Ninja instead. The Human Priest also became a Gnome instead, and one of the Elven Samurai was changed to Human - only because of style, because I wanted to use a certain portrait for her.
My observations so far, without nailing numbers, and in no particular order:
- Humans are so mediocre that there's no point in having one along but for aesthetic/rpg/racist reasons
- Dwarves seem to be a race intended for spellcasting classes (WTF?!?); they get low(est) HP and high(est) SP
- H-Orcs still suck as casters and in Thievery, but gain even more HP
- Elves only gain one HP less than Humans, but noticeably higher SP (haven't tested if higher SP still only applies to arcane casters)
- Gnomes are the new shit - higher HP and SP compared to Humans, but retain their lower Thievery bonus compared to Dwarves
- Barbarians start out with the Thievery skill (maybe Ludmeister likes Conan?), with no bonus, and they seem to get even more HP
- since H-Orcs still are only worthwhile as Barbarians or Knights, a H-Orc Barbarian nets a barrel full of HP (I think it was 29 at L1 with 20 END) and really sucky Thievery due to the racial penalty that still applies
- Barbarians gain attacks slower now, at what looks like as the same rate as Rangers
- Ninjas gain attacks the fastest, but still are challenged when it comes to
armor kimonos
- Knights, unless they have some hidden, really crazy to-hit combat bonus or some such, now really suck; they gain attacks slower than some of the hybrid classes, but still can use all weapons and armor (and enjoy while looking pretty in their awesome stuff while the others actually kill stuff)
- Knights suck so hard that they should've gained a "No love from Ludmeister" award right from the beginning
- Knights suck even harder than Druids suck in WoX
- Druids gain attacks slightly faster than
Clerics Priests, but still are sucky (screw this, I'm taking Fineous, the Beaconing Waterwalking Keymaster, along anyway - at least he's not a Knight)
- there are now 3 tiers for shields (buckler/round shield/tower shield)
- Samurais got all the love; they are hybrid fighter/arcane casters like before, BUT
- they get to use the highest armor tier
- they get to use the second highest shield tier
- they can use most weapons
- so far, they seem to get the highest increase in attacks/level second only to Ninjas
- the constant monster respawing makes the game a real grind-fest, with shit-loads of money and gems flying at the party quite early, especially when (ab-)using fountains and knowing the mirror keywords for the later towns
- some spells like Fireball and Lightning Bolt have fixed (reasonably high) casting cost, but still level-scale damage-wise
- item materials aren't tiered as orderly as before; like some materials now give a higher attack boost, but no or lower damage boost, so obsidian is not the 42 in gearing anymore
- taking into account the higher bonuses received from a high Accuracy stat, weapons only dealing non-physical damage now seem more worthwhile
- the Duplication spell is full of surprises in what it can duplicate, really
- bonuses from high statistics really take off when reaching and going past 50
- each of the seven statistics can be increased for one point per 2000 gold at fountains in/after "clearing" Fountain Head
I'm pretty sure I'm forgetting something in this write-up, but whatever. I'm old, (but) I remember playing MM3 when it was new.
So, what gives? Essentially a "Might and Magic 3 - Asian-themed Munchkin Edition" that to me feels like an early version of Diablo 2 in some ways, and balancing issues taken to the next level. But quite fun so far. I'm also a bit curious as to how a Sorcerer-heavy party would fare. Probably quite good, since it wouldn't surprise me in the slightest if Sorcerers were better in melee than Knights. Did I mention that Knights suck in this mod?
(So, time to get rid of that dead weight in form of Sir Gallant. Need to find Charity to investigate what happened to Paladins in "MM3 - AtME". Given that they didn't get renamed/japanized, probably not much.)
EDIT/ADDENDUM:
So it turns out that Paladins are even worse fighters than Knights. At least there's some consistency with regard to the unmodded game, I guess. But then again, the Paladin's attacks/level are suspiciously close to what I got for the Druid. The saving grace for the Paladin might be its item compatibility and better spell selection.
With the Paladin also being a disappointment, instead going for the real deal and taking the Priest hireling would be the way to go. But she's so fugly.
So it seems that Lone Wolf has found a new pack.
EDIT/ADDENDUM 2: More observations
- the maximum bonus from when a statistic is at 250+ is now 50 compared to 20 in vanilla