1) hot patch v136 is cooking for you as I type this (goes over v135 save games without needing a restart).
a) So far the one thing you'll notice is quieter "sci fi sound" (which comes from dark bolt spell)
It wasn't the charm person after all (or at least, its used for dark bolt only now).
b) Fly is not finished. You don't have to fly. It was something for you to see once, but it can't be spammed right now. If you try to use it twice you get the red error message you mentioned. This tells me you haven't had time to practice using it correctly. But there's plenty of things you currently have issues with in 2014 that are solved already in what I sent.
First, forget using tournaments to make money. Instead explore the economy. There is a greater difference between high and low prices, especially for salt, iron, silk, and even cheese, wool, and grapes. Don't assume you have to make only silk enterprises. At different towns, there are more profitable enterprises -- and you might lose money at Jelkala or around there on silk. Next, not every place likes you now. As you mix up your party, some places will dislike your party mix, and volunteers will be fewer to none. You can direct recruit prisoners, by talking to them one at a time. If one spits at you and rejects your offer, try again after an in game hour. Some that don't really hate you that much might change their mind. This is a fine way to gather an army very quickly. Next enterprises pay more, improvements cost less (especially in villages), and food has many more servings (and greater diversity). Diversity matters -- which do you want tomorrow -- 5 loaves of the same bread, or bread, cheese, wine, fruit, and raisins? The one bread gave a morale bonus, every bread after that gave no morale bonus, but every single new category of food/drink is giving a separate morale bonus. So diversify.
Next, diplomacy lets you sell troops at your own city/castles after you've been your own boss starting on the 12th day (when the constable is hired). You get a second inventory at that time as well. The chamberlain comes first -- with your first fief (and he has a safe inventory -- if you lose the fief, he still has whatever you put in his inventory when you get a property (any property) back. Wife as a companion -- romantic, adventurous, moral, and ambitious wife personalities will agree to join your party and can be managed as companions. They cant be captured if you fall in battle, although you should them away by talking to them and telling them to go to safety - just in case my safety net fails. They skill up . Also women tend to be much tougher than you expected -- Drow especially, also elf and blazing hand (these are the three Queens). Women tend to be slightly physically weaker, but slightly more agile, which would be good news if dodging was turned on (which it won't be for 2 weeks or so).
Also there is a slight buff in magic resistance for almost everyone except orcs, skeletons, and zombies, making magic slightly less OP. If you have a big party you can toggle on epidemics at Phantasy game settings and put your party to work burying dead or treating the epidemic if you have high party healer skills. This pays very well, and you can still sing as entertainment while your party does work. Clerics who also have entertainment are a good money making opportunity. Harps and lutes are much harder to find -- you might have to visit 6-8 villages to find one; I once had to go to 12 villages.
I have rigale crafting turned off because it needs a fair amount of money and time to become any good at it and would frustrating if you don't know what you're doing. The thing is -- it can be turned on and off. I'm suspicious of either rigale fairs or rigale temporary harvests causing stability issues, so patch v135 had them turned off with no way for you to toggle them back, but probably v136 can toggle back temporary harvests. I'm leaning towards leaving fairs permanently toggled off, which I look for anything else happening in the background that could lose stability.
Also I don't know if you really followed the progress lately, but things are different in subtle ways. Even auto-calc now understands mages and clerics, and adjusts for autocalc battles at sieges and according to terrain (unless you disable Diplomacy terrain in autocalc, which also disables mage and cleric awareness). There are a number of new features from diplomacy and PBOD/formations - such as what to have the AI do with archers that are out of ammunition, or should battles continue with a charge when you go down (synchronized across Diplomacy and PBOD - so changing in either toggles likewise in both), or should pikes/spears be auto-braced against horses? These are simple on/off switches in Phantasy settings (camp menu) and there are separate settings for PBOD and Diplomacy as well. Thus this gives 3 places to change things, with Phantasy settings being the cleanest as changes to toggles are shown immediately.
Also you asked about "I wish I could see the stats of a master mage". You can see the stats of every troop, king, queen, lord, lady, companion, mercenary, and follower in the game, in real time. As you change gear on companions it shows and any calculated stats (such as weight carried and dodging) are instantly updated, as are skills assigned. This is Reports: Reference Items: and there are 4 different troop viewers. There are hidden viewers as well that are seen when the cheat menu is on, which dump not to the display but to recent messages. These are reference section under reports showing all the trade routes, prejudice, and test your party against random troops to see how strongly they like and dislike your party. You can instant level troops in the cheat menu, vote yourself money, heal your party, and so on if you really just want to spend a few minutes with the mod. Or play from the start, like always, and I think if you think outside the box you'll do better.
Quests, fancy flying, and tournaments don't work. Flight was something simple that you can only do once when selecting "visit village center" from the village activities menu. Once you spawn in the village, dont waste your one and only flight. Instead go climb a hill or back your way up on a rock. Stay on your mount if you wish; as I wrote the glide it was for use with a specific horse and I just made it work with every horse used by the player, and for the moment only the player. Face forward, making absolutely sure you're not on flat ground, press one time only the "0" key on the keypad (and no where else), and you instantly start gliding forward and dropping altitude slowly, accelerating with each drop in height. Turn with 1,3,7,9,/,* and trade speed for height with 8 and height for speed with 2. Your one flight ends when you hit ground again. After that its over. Glide was meant as a test of game mechanics to prove the concept works, and thats all it does. Its still fairly amazing if you find a place with lots of hills at a village, as you fly over the villagers and their houses. But that isn't how you spend 6 hours of time, or 1. Its more so you dont give up because you reckon you already know everything in 2014 and you're pining for that experience. 2017 is different. Whether good different or bad different, thats for you to decide. But its different. Thats why I said you need to learn new strategies, and not just recycle what worked in 2014. Magic limits are much stricter for wearing heavy armor in 2017; but armor is slightly lighter, much of it, and the costs are different too. Orcs are harder hitting than you remember; in general, every troop probably fights better than you do at first, especially counting dodge (which is fairly weak in melee and mainly affects throwing weapons and slow moving bows). Spells and cleric summoned weapons can't be dodged, at all.
There is a cool down on dodge, to prevent back to back dodges. You can dodge as well; you'll dodge best with high athletics and agility while carrying a light load of gear and with higher strength so what gear you have weighs less than your strength (or ideally, your strength is 2-3 times more than your weight carried). There will be buffs and debuffs next month, and differences in how good and evil cast spells; but for now that layer is as you remember from 2014.
So, there is a learning curve. But I think compared to 2014, its worth it. Even without, for now, quests and tournaments. Or for that matter, flying.
- GS
TODAY.
