Undine Boosted Damage bug

Bug Reports
1

Platform, device version and operating system: Steam, Windows 10, GoW version 4.5.0.07

Screenshot:

Undine%20Boost
Undine%20Boost1143×723 268 KB

What you were expecting to happen, and what actually happened: Undine’s ability “Ocean’s Ruler” is boosted by Merfolk and Submerged allies. Undine’s trait Tidal King submerges him at the start of every turn. Therefore, he is submerged before you cast his spell. Because of that, when you look at the Boost Ratio, it counts 8 damage boost from him being a Merfolk and another 8 for him being Submerged. So it reports that he’ll do (Magic+5)+(Submerged Allies8)+(Merfolk Allies8).

In the screenshot above, I have 3 Merfolks (Leviathan, my Hero, and Undine – Aquaticus is somehow just an Elemental/Mystic, not a Merfolk), and one Submerged troop. It says his Boost is +32, on top of the 29 damage. That’s 61 damage, but if you cast it, he’ll only do 53 damage, because when he casts, he loses his submerge and it isn’t included in the boost anymore.

In other words, Undine’s reported Boost damage is always 8 higher than it actually is if he’s Submerged.

How often does this happen? When did it begin happening?

All the time, but more specifically it’s only noticeable because of the Boost Ratio reporting how much damage it does.

Steps to make it happen again
Allow Undine to submerge himself (or submerge him from another troop, like Aquaticus’ trait), then go to cast his ability, the Boost Ratio will include his Submerge status, but when you cast it, it will be 8 less damage than reported.

4

This is sort of a corner case. The Boost number displayed is calculated by looking at the current state of the game, not at what the state would look like as the spell resolves. It’s really the only viable way to do it without complicating things a lot.

To give an example, consider some part of the spell resolution containing a random element, e.g. one of the troops having the trait “Allies have a 50% chance of keeping positive effects whenever they would expire”. Casting the spell could either get Boosted by 32 (if the trait kicks in) or by 24 (if the trait doesn’t kick in). You could predetermine how the next casting of the spell is going to resolve and display the correct number, but then you’d be leaking information. You could display both numbers (or multiple numbers if even more factors are able to kick in), but then you’d just confuse players.

5

Once you hit cast though, you can’t cancel that action, so the state of the game should be a snapshot immediately before you hit cast. In other words, there should be no difference in the state of the game right before you hit cast and when the spell resolves.

Consider Suna. If there are two enemies on the board and one of them will die from her spell, both enemies are both the weakest and the strongest. She will steal life from both of them, killing one of them, and still steal 8 magic from both of them as well, even though that comes after killing one of them. It all resolves at the same time. Undine should be no different. It should look at the state of the board right before you hit cast.