Heroes of Might & Magic V - Role Playing Edition v1.0

Heroes of Might & Magic V - Role Playing Edition v1.0

A huge change to Heroes of Might & Magic 5, Role Playing Edition includes a completely new game framework that allows for 24 characters classes, a reconstructed skill system, many new heroes, improved AI and interface texts, balance tweaks and much more!

NEW VERSION 1.0 RELEASED !!!!!!!!!!

Hi to all HOMM fans!

Today I will present to you a new descendent in the HOMM series. The HOMM5: Role playing edition (currently version 0.9 Beta). I don’t know if I should describe this as an expansion pack, a TC mod or a new game, but at least I can say this mod is huge. It took me almost a year to build. This mod is basically a redevelopment of the dual classes project that required to be restarted with a greater ambition. Extensive testing on the dual classes project proved me that it was impossible to implement might and magic classes in H5 in a balanced way without a complete revision of core parts of the game. Furthermore implementing new classes proved not only a question about classes, skill trees and development paths but also spells, AI, town guilds, war machines and even some creatures needed to be rebalanced. There were also many compatibility issues with popular mods that needed to be solved.This all made me decide to follow a more WOG-like approach to the project, by upgrading all aspects of the game, but give players at the same time as much as possible freedom to what functions to use and what not. I created a new framework that allows for 24 character classes, 999 NCF creatures, level 4-7 dwellings, RTMG and Tournament Edition scripts. I reconstructed the skill system from the ground up for 24 character classes and 96 multiplayer heroes (instead of 64). I also greatly improved the AI and interface texts. I added balance mods for spells, creatures, weeks, war machines, building prices (all these functions can be optionally installed!).

In the H5 Role Playing Edition fully working new character classes for all factions are finally a reality!

The result is supposed to be the most advanced version of H5 today. Compared to H5:TOE, the H5 Role playing edition will add an endless amount of variation and new strategies by having might, magic and balanced classes for every faction. H5 RPE will give a much deeper game play experience. Formerly playing Dungeon was always a destructive spam fest while haven was always a might powerhouse with light magic. In H5 RPE on the other hand you can play ANY strategy with ANY faction. H5 RPE has the most challenging AI, many new skills and all the new content is supposed to fit in the Ashan world and lore.

Before I will continue on the details I first and foremost would like to thank all the people who have intentionally or unintentionally contributed to the creation of this project and I hope to be able to add more people to the list soon. Projects like this are never really finished and I hope many people will come, play and give comments. I am also looking for people interested in making better skins and icons.

Credits:

Magnomagus: project lead, design, programming and manuals.

Kronos1000: For hex-editing the H5 exe to allow the creation of new classes.

BAD: For hex-editing the H5 exe to allow hero development above level 30.

Simonak: for his work on the NCF framework 3.1 and help with technical issues.

Sfidanza: for his work on the original NCF framework and the H5 manual.

TSoD: for creating level 4-7 dwellings and improved creature icons.

Marzhin: for his DM map that included some useful content.

Alcibiades: for his work on balancing buildings and always constructive input.

Cepheus: for his help with technical issues.

Moz: For the HOMM5 tournament edition that included many good ideas.

Mirthless/PvP: for his cool balance scripts.

Alexoff: for his cool AI scripts.

Spamm: for his text improvements.

Fiur: for fixing the refugee camp.

Fauch: for some great ideas.

Curio: for his cheating guide, that is actually my favorite modders handbook.

I also would like to thank Cleave, Willow & Vokial for their enthusiasm and support of my mods.

Guide for further reading this thread.

I realize this thread is probably too small and too large at the same time. It is too small because there are so many things to explain and discuss I could easily use a whole sub forum and too large because there may not very much people left these days who are willing to go through all this info and post their criticism. Therefore I will give these directions. The mod is quite a large download, so perhaps you want to start already. I have included 4 manuals (~200 pages) that will show all the details of H5 RPE, so on the forum I will try to limit myself to explaining the main idea of the class system and provide many in game screenshots and some pages from the manuals, so you can easily decide if you are interested in this (if are not already). This mod will be very easy to play, i made many improvements to the interface to make many things clear from ingame.

Features

-24 Character classes (22 full working with unique development paths and skill trees)

-might, magic and balance classes for every faction

-96 Multiplayer heroes (12 for every faction, 4 for every class)

-Many new skills, specializations and much better balanced skills.

-Hero Development above level 30

-The most challenging AI ever.

-Optional balance mods for spells, creatures, buildings, war machines & weeks

-Many interface improvements.

-Compatible with NCF Framework

-Compatible with 4-7 dwellings

-Compatible with RTMG

-Compatible with TE edition scripts & AI Scripts

-Compatible with Alcibiades building mod

-Compatible with xazardous mods but not: Xaz Backs and ingame skillwheel (wouldn't make any sense)

-200 page manual, with all skill trees and heroes

The New Class System

As the name already hints, this mod will involve a huge improvement of the role playing aspect of the game. Three games, which are largely popular among HOMM players, have been the main inspiration for the new class system design. These games are Kings Bounty: the Legend, HOMM3 WOG and HOMM4. Since people are often referring to these games when criticizing H5 I tried to create a ‘perfect blend’ of these games to greatly enhance the role playing part of the game.

Like the KB every faction will now have 3 classes, a might class, a magic class and a balanced class. For example Sylvan will have Rangers, Wardens and Druids. In H5: RPE factions will also be less black & white. Pretty much every faction has a class with a dark side to it, which is able to learn unique ‘bad’ skills. Since having 24 classes would mean an incredible amount of complex skill wheels, the secondary skill trees are redesigned in such a way that special perks always come after the same standard perks. That way the player doesn’t need any in game skill wheels but starts automatically memorizing the skill system from the first time he plays, just like he used to do when playing H3 or H4.

In H5RPE racial skills will no longer exist, because their nature would immediately steer the class in a certain direction. In H5RPE classes will be determined in the same way as H4. Every skill in the game determines a class. The following scheme shows the 24 skills in the game with their corresponding classes. Reavers and death knights are the death versions of knights and paladins, therefore they start with the same skill.

When the skills are sorted out by faction, the scheme with probability factors for primary skills looks like this:

The following scheme shows an example of how the secondary skill development for a single class is constructed.

When the secondary skills and primary skills progressions are finished the only remaining task is to add 4 appropriate specializations to the class, because every faction will have 12 heroes (4 heroes per class). The followings cards shows all the details about the Ranger, the Warden and Druid. The manual in pdf format will contain all the cards for all classes (in HQ):

Now let’s see how the concept works out in game. Before selecting your starting heroes, notice that the mod includes all the enhancements of the Advanced AI for 3.1 with many more options. The mod will also support the use of AI scripts created by Alexoff from the Russian community. Furthermore the AI will be able to play with all 24 classes and make better skill choices at leveling up. It will also less often leave artifacts on the adventure map. In the hero selection screen you will see both the class and specialization of the heroes. If you like statistics you will love the extended specialization descriptions.

New Skills

The H5RPE has several new secondary skills that can be used by many different classes. The two most important ones are Combat & Occultism.

Combat is a skill highly favorable by might classes and focuses entirely on improving the (non-magical) attack abilities of the hero. The Combat skill determines the Knight class, but death knights, barbarians, rangers, engineers and demon lords will most likely also pick it. Some balanced classes like Paladins can also learn it. The combat skill will make the hero attack a viable alternative for destructive magic in late game, especially in dealing with high level creatures.

Occultism is a skill only favorable by classes with a very strong focus on destructive and/or dark magic. Occultism defines the Warlock class, but Sorcerers, Flamekeepers and Elementalists will often also pick it. The Occultism skill focuses on rituals and improving the destructive and dark magic capabilities of the hero. As you can see the skill is internally build from the irresistible magic skill but it has many new perks.

In the H5: RPE all secondary skills are constructed according to a 3+3+1 scheme. Why? first of all because there are not enough skills in the game to fill all skills to 3+3+3 and secondly because having the middle skill (in case of the defense: vitality) at the start of the game will maintain the possibility to get any of the special perks. In H5: RPE every branch follows a logical theme, for example a new branch is constructed in defense entirely based on magic protection: Armorer (gives 15% magic proof) => Forge master (gives an additional 15% magic proof)

I swapped, some icons, names and effects to make skills more useful and fit in other secondaries:

Magic schools

In H5: RPE the Sylvan Mage Guild gives: Light + Summoning Magic. The Dungeon Mage Guild gives: Dark + Destructive Magic. It was necessary to give dungeon a less spell power dependant magic school for the overlord and assassin classes. Summoning will better fit the nature theme of Sylvan.

System requirements

You will need patch 3.1 to use this mod

Currently the mod is in english only.

Known unsolvable issues

-You cannot generate maps with H5_RPE_Game.exe (issue since NCF3.0), just generate maps in the editor or H5_Game and reload.

-Witch huts don't give shatters to non stronghold classes, they don't give occultism or combat either. Just don't care about it, if a witch hut gives occultism to your overlord you would be screwed anyway.

Work that needs to be done

-Don't bother with the duel mode, it needs a redesign.

-Don't bother playing campaigns (makes no sense anyway)

-Some more unique skins would be welcome.

-Further balancing (as usual)

Buglist

Promising

Famous Hero

modding wizard

posted February 05, 2010 05:36 PM Edited by magnomagus at 07:27, 07 Feb 2010.

MORE DETAILS ABOUT THE MOD

The Universal Skill Tree

For discussing the internal skill system I will post here the universal skill tree. Let me first give an example how this works:

Let's say you have picked the warden class from above and you want to see what his secondary skill tree looks like. In H5 RPE this question

is really easy to answer. All you have to do is collect the 12 skills he is able to learn from this universal one and you know his skill tree. the warlock is the only class that has an alternative branching of the occultism skill (because it's the only class able to use elemental chains). You will notice that many skills like offensive formations, mark of the wizard (mark of the sorcerer), mark of the necromancer (spirit link) and consume corpse can now be used by many different classes for adding many new strategic dimensions to the game. For balance reasons there are currently 11 skills that need extra requirements. For example: the current extra requirements prevent having empowered spells + mark of the sorcerer.

Balance changes to skills:

counterstrike (combat) damage => 10%-15%-20%

attack (offense) damage = 10%-15%-20%

retribution = 2,5% per morale (shifts damage from offense skill to the base skill, for better might vs magic balance)

benediction (prayer) => +2 to attributes

death scream => -2 to attributes

luck = 1.8x damage, bad luck = 0,6xdamage

elven luck (critical hit) = x2.0

demonic fire x1.5 damage, mana 4 (was 5)

lord of undead +10% necromancy

spirit link = 50HP for one mana

stormwind = 20% , -1

tremors damage = 100 + 10 x power

banish +100 damage per mastery

mana burst => x15 damage per level

corrupted soil => x7 damage per level

imbue arrow atbdrop 0.25

runic machines (engineering) => +2 initiative

goblin support => +2 goblins

stunningblow (stunning strike) => atb drop 0,2

luck barbarian (forge master) => 15% magic proof (was broken skill)

shatters scale better => 1-1-1-0-0 => 2-2-1-1-0 => 2-2-2-2-1

shatters atb drop => -30%

shatters power drop => -30%

master of lightning => atbdrop 0,4

Hero Specializations

These changes are made to make some campaign hero specializations useful for multiplayer, furthermore wasp swarm and disrupter are boosted.

paragon knight => benediction x1.5

aura of swiftness => +0,05% initiative per level

wasp swarm 10% per level + 0,025 atb per level

disrupter= 20*level/3

radiant mirror prob 0,5

reanimator level divisor => 3

bombardier level divisor => 3

feathermage +0.5 base initiative

intimidate => -0,05% initiative per level

shadow dancer => +1% evasion per level

mountain king = rune of magic control

borderguard = +1 defense for every 5 levels, always works

blooddrinker level divisor => 5

centaur atb increase = 0,5% per hero level (was 1%)

Creature Abilities

These changes are largely based on duel maps and H5: TE

weakening aura = +1 attack decrease

unicorn spellpower =14

precise shot range = 4

warding arrows proc factor=1.5

torpor proc factor=2.5

treant +5 heal per treant

agility +1 def per cel

ride-by-attack dam = 0,4 instead of 0,25

aura of bravery gives +2 morale

death wail damage x1,5, range +1

call Storm damage per creature = 20

Call Storm shoot penalty = 0,02 instead of 0,01 up to 0,8

liquid flamebreath = 20 dam per creature

leap distance = 8, retaliation = x1.2 + 0,1 per leaped cell.

piercing arrow = ignores 0,25% defense

Optional Add-ons

These balance mods can be optionally installed, but using them is not necessary.

H5-RPE-Spells.h5u

The Spells addition is the most recommended balance mod, because it makes the balance between might and magic classes much better. The balance changes are making light and dark magic somewhat more spell power dependent (otherwise the difference between might heroes and balanced heroes in using light and dark magic would be too small). Further balance changes are inspired by the tournament edition. The changes are:

-All curse and bless durations (I don’t mean only curse and bless) are calculated like 1+0,5* Spellpower

-Firewall moved back to summoning level 4 with some more damage (but less then fireball). This is to provide the full magic classes from light+summoning factions with some more direct damage doing potential. Since all classes have a straight way to ignite firewall also became somewhat redundant in H5: RPE.

-Spells that increase or decrease primary skills are set to increase/decrease by 4,8,6,10. (not vulnerability)

-Haste and slow are changed to increase/decrease initiative by 15/20/25/30%

-Divine Vengeance lifted to level 5

-Word of light and Curse of the Netherworld lowered to level 4 and damage roughly halved.

-Phantom Forces lifted to level 4

-Summon Hive lowered to level 3

-Rune of charge lifted to level 2

-Rune of Revive lifted to level 5

-Rune of magic control lowered to level 1

-Rune of dragon form lowered to level 4

-Decay, eldritch arrow, stone spikes, implosion, deep freeze, Armageddon damage increase more gradually with mastery levels. (has almost no influence on maximum damage)

Horde’s Anger = 0.8 damage per creature (was 1)

H5-RPE-Creatures.h5u

The creature mod is build on 3 principles:

-Making alternatives ‘true’ alternatives.

-Fixing balance problems with classes. (Flamekeeper+Immunity to fire)

-Implementing some popular balance changes from TE, TOH mod and the forums.

The changes are:

Steel Golems +1 initiative

Combat mage can cast magic fist on advanced level

Titan +20HP, no range attacker, call lightning = 40*number creatures

Witches +1 growth

Shadow Matriarch, no range penalty, slow, cleansing, disrupting ray, bloodlust (all advanced)

shadow mistress, slow, forgetfulness, disrupting ray, weakness (all advanced)

red dragon = immunity to mind control

berzerker = +1 speed, +1 min damage

flame mage, flamekeeper & warlord = 50% fire proof instead of immune

lava dragon +5 attack

marksman +2 hp

inquisitor (good) = haste, bless, stoneskin, cleansing

zealot (bad) = bloodlust, confusion, slow, disrupting ray

infernal succubus = +1 min damage

pit lord = meteor show advanced, fireball expert, disrupting ray expert

horned demon +2HP, +1 defense

hellmare (defensive) = 16A, 18D 9-16dam +10HP -1 initiative, frightful aura (visually correct)

frightful nightmare (offensive)= 18A 16D,9-16dam, searing aura (visually correct)

quasit +1 speed

pit fiend advanced fireball

archdemon (defensive) +1 def +5HP

archlich add slow spell

plague zombies (offensive) +1 attack +1 initiative

rot zombies (defensive) +2hp

centaur marauder att +1 def +1

sky daughter has advanced chain lightning

pixies,sprites and dryads +2 growth

arcane archer 7-8 damage

war dancer +1 max damage

H5-RPE-WarMachines09.h5u

In H5: RPE all might heroes start with a war machine, but NEVER a ballista (not even the engineer class). All factions have to pay equal prices for war machines: 3000 - Ballista, 1500 – Ammo Cart, 750 – First Aid Tent. The amount of turns for the first aid tent is increased to 6 to keep all branches from the war machine skill interesting.

H5-RPE-Weeks09.h5u

Turns of annoying weeks like weeks of disease.

The AI (Details)

The goal is to give H5: RPE the best and most challenging AI and adventure map experience ever. Therefore the core of the mod is build on the advanced AI I released earlier for 3.1, but there are also several new features.

All classes

The Ai works for all classes and will pick skills that are more useful to him.

Treasure Buildings

A lot of players might have noticed that by default all treasure buildings (crypts, derelict ships, pyramids etc.) are balanced against the easy/normal difficulty setting from the original game, often make it ridiculously simple to obtain large treasures from these buildings. A lot of treasure buildings also lack variation. In this mod I added more then 1000 lines !!! to the defaultstats.xdb to create an entirely new experience in treasure hunting. All treasure buildings now offer 10 different battles. You will also be able to meet the new alternative upgrades in all treasure buildings. All creatures will fit in their surroundings (a crypt will only contain necro-creatures) and armies will always have a good mix (shooters, walkers, same faction: no morale penalties). In general the power of the variants you will meet in treasure buildings ranges between 1.5-2x the power of the original variants (take that in mind before entering one).

I didn't make very much changes to elemental stockpile (I don't think I need to explain). It is too much work to describe all the changes in detail, Just start playing and you will be pleasantly surprised!

Adjustments

-it can cast 5th level spells,

-it doesn’t center spells on creatures (stone spikes etc.),

-it considers movement paths on the battlefield, that allows him to strike first.

-value of towns increased (like heroic)

-value of grail increased (like heroic)

-protects important towns better (like heroic)

-it tries to build every day (like hard and heroic)

-the computer is less interested in attacking computer players (like heroic)

-the computer creates one main hero and a support hero when it owns one town, it creates one hero for every new town it conquers, up to a maximum of 8. (This setting is probably most human-like)

-the computer is more interested in border guards keys, value is the same as major artifact (9000), it was lower than minor artifact (1500).

-Artifact values are increased to prevent the AI leaving artifacts on the adventure map. (bug fix, will not always work)

Scripts

H5-RPE-AI-Scripts.h5u

The AI scripts from Alexoff make the AI more challenging by giving it extra creatures and resources, it also has the ability to prevent AI heroes from fleeing (will be asked when starting a new game). Take in mind scripts can only work if scripts are activated on the map you are currently playing. H5-RPE-Core09.h5u activates scripts on all official multiplayer maps. If you want to know how to activate scripts refer to the scripts section at the end of this manual.

H5-RPE-TE-Scripts.h5u

I am providing the tournament edition scripts by permission from PvP/Mirthless. The TE scripts do many things to make the mod more balanced, but since these scripts are made by Russians it is difficult for me to provide a complete detailed change list. I hope to deal with this later. If you decide to use the scripts you may find some surprises. At least I know of the following improvements:

-Death Knights will be able to lower the morale of the enemy hero when using leadership (it doesn’t work for neutral creatures), they also need necromancy for the effect to work

-The defend us all skill and the battle commander skill are giving extra creatures in a more balanced way.

-The resistance skill gives an additional defense of +1 for every 5 hero levels

-many weak skills like exploding corpses, fiery wrath and cold steel give additional primary skills.

-The dark ritual specialization gives increased mana over a period of a week, after using the skill?

-The altar of sacrifice from the dungeon town provides extra blood witches per week.

-The altar if sacrifice from the inferno town provides a one time experience bonus of 1000, and weekly gold income?

-The memory mentor has limitations in the amount of skills you can relearn in a daytime?

-The starting bonus if resources are chosen is higher.

-You cannot receive the sextant artifact as starting bonus.

How to activate scripts?

Scripts can only work if scripts are activated on the map you are currently playing. H5-RPE-Core09.h5u activates scripts on all official multiplayer maps. If you want to activate map scripts on a custom map or random map you have to use the map properties tree in the editor and refer to a ‘dummy_mapscript.xdb’ file, in xml language:

It doesn’t matter the dummy_mapscript.xdb doesn’t exist, therefore you could also have called it ‘stupid_idiot.xdb’, the important thing is: it just works! If a map is already using scripts (most singleplayer storyline maps) then you should not do this, and sometimes conflicts with the TE and AI scripts might occur.