How about allowing all troops to be able to back out of casting a spell in the targeting phase? The only troop that can do it (I think) is wand of stars. Once you cast and it asks you to choose which spell mode to use, you can back out and choose a different troop to use or another action if you change your mind.
With any other troop, once you cast a spell and have to select an enemy troop to target or a gem on the board, you are locked into it. You cannot back out and choose a different action. It would be great if we’re able to do this with any troop, since sometimes muscle memory takes over and you realize too late that you’d rather take a different action.
6 Likes
Actually, any troop with a “choose one” effect in it’s spell can do it. Vulpacea troops, mainly can, as they tend to have that in their spell, along with a handful of others, I think. there’s a few different weapons, too, mainly from Vulpacea as well (Court scepter, Cunning thorn, Foxglove, Spiritshot, Stormgard’s hammer, Vulpine protector, Wand of stars). All of them should work (just tested with Spiritshot and it worked).
Basically, the spell lets you choose between two different spells. Until you select one, you can still cancel back out, but once you select a spell, even if you still need to select a target, you can’t cancel out. (Just tested with Court scepter, and was able to cancel out when picking between spells, but not when choosing a target for the spell after picking it.)
I would agree with you, though. Starting to cast a spell, then realising you don’t want to, is annoying, so if you haven’t selected the target yet, it would be great to be able to cancel back out.
1 Like
It is, however, important to note that this request isn’t as simple to implement as it looks on the surface.
1st - Any “on cast” traits (Arcane, etc) already trigger before entering the target phase. This is technically fixable…
2nd - except for the edge cases of certain specific “on cast” traits – for example, if your team has a troop with “Bad Tarot” and you cast a targeted spell, are you allowed to select an otherwise Stealthy enemy Troop if Bad Tarot happens to activate and randomly Stun them? In the current game, whether this happens is already fixed prior to targeting, but otherwise you potentially enable a (relatively minor) exploit of spam-canceling a spellcast until an “on cast” trait randomly rolls a specific effect you’re looking for.
3rd - Even that is technically fixable with some implementation of RNG states (similar to save states), but that’s adding lot of internal complexity to the battle engine for relatively little (albeit super convenient in some cases) benefit.
For example, there’s been a bug where if a Heroic Gem (e.g. Lycanthropy, Burn, etc) is floating across the board during target selection it will actually remove the troop from the list of targets, which in the past led to some extremely easy softlock states. The ability to cancel out of spell targeting could have fixed that, but…
3 Likes
Errmm, apart from obvious technical considerations (and unavoidable bugs that will for sure come with it) backing out of spells is unnecessary.
Either take your time carefully choosing what to do or simply stop being a wuss about it and accept that your screwup is your screwup and it’s part of the game. Have I been in situations where it’s be advantageous to back out of a spell? Sure, but I own up it. Have I been in a situation where I lose 120 dragonite because my finger slipped on a touchscreen and opened a trap room instead of starting a battle? Sure, but again I own up to it.
Or, contrariwise, they should really spend a lot of time implementing this, then spend a whole lot more of time to fixing and tinkering until it actually works, but - the commodity should come with a price tag. That would swiftly set things clear about who really wants to back out of a spell.
5 Likes
Ummm I am not sure why you are actually taking the time and (by your tone) elevating your blood pressure just to type that rant and call me a wuss over a perfectly reasonable suggestion. As I recall, not too long ago, the devs asked for ideas for “quality of life improvements” and this would be exactly that.
Typing a full paragraph just to tell us how clumsy you are, and how we’re spoiled brats is not helpful in the least. If the devs deem that this request is not worth their time or is technically unfeasible, then they simply won’t consider it. No one is holding a gun to their heads and making them implement every idea that pops into someone’s head and they posts about it here.
So if you have any constructive criticism as to why implementing this feature would be detrimental, then I would love to hear it. Let the devs worry about their own time/resource management issues.
Also, suggesting that they should charge players for implementing this idea is beyond ridiculous.
Like the 50-gold “scouting fee” charged to players who aren’t VIP3?
2 Likes
Yeah losing that 50 gold keeps me up at night thinking about it. 