SC2Mapster

Hey everyone, I'm having a strange problem. I have a spell which deals 20 damage and is supposed to deal 15 extra damage per level. The way I set this up is to use a "Set" effect which, for level 3 for example, has the 20 base damage and two of the 15 "level damage" effects, which would sum up to 50 damage. For some reason though, the spell is doing much, much more damage than expected. At level 5 it is supposed to deal 75 damage with the above method, but it is apparently dealing upwards of 300 damage. Anyone have any idea why this might be happening? Those that are claiming this ridiculous damage output claim that they observed it when the hero was at a very high level (say 25 or so, compared to the required max level of 5 to obtain the final level of the spell). Any ideas?

@DrSuperEvil: Go

My ability is as follows: It is a simple frost spell which deals damage on impact, and also slows the target on impact. What this entails is: A launch missile spell for each level, the launch missile has an impact effect which is a "Set" type. For example, at level 1, the ability's effect is "Launch Frost Missile Level 1" whose impact effect is "Frost Set Level 1". Each impact set has several effects. Each level has an "Apply Behavior" effect which is the slow. Each set has a "Damage" effect called "Frost Base damage" in which the damage value is 20. Then, in order to scale the damage, I created another "Damage" effect called "Frost Level Damage". This damage effect has a value of 2.5. So, in order for my level 2 frost to deal 22.5 damage, I have included the base damage and one copy of the Level damage. Then for level 3, the set includes the base damage and two copies of the Level damage (25 total damage now, ideally). This method is repeated up to level five which then has, in total, a slow, a base damage effect, and 4 level damage effects to deal a total of 30 damage. What's happening though is that this damage is not always equal to the amount it should do. I am lost as to why this may be, and the system has no triggers involved either.

So I guess the short answer is: It's set up with several copies of a "Damage" effect, no stacking +% damage buffs are used, and no triggers are used.

Is the damage for each level always consistent or does it change randomly each time you use the ability?

If you can't figure out the problem then the easiest thing to do would be making a damage effect for each level, though I'm assuming you went with your method to avoid that.

@Spoolofwhool: Go

I think it changes randomly for each time the ability is used. I am not certain of this, but what I do know is that at higher hero levels the ability does much more than it is supposed to. I did have someone claim that the ability only did 19 damage at level 2 once. So really, I have no idea what's going on, seems to be all over the place.

try adding alerts to all effects and have a look how often they fire

How do you have your set and damage effects set up?

Quote from Spoolofwhool: Go

How do you have your set and damage effects set up?

There are the following effects for the ability:

Frost Base Damage: A damage effect which deals 20 spell damage.

Frost Level Damage: A damage effect which deals 2.5 spell damage.

And for the sets I have listed the effects for each set:

Level 1 Set: Frost Base Damage

Level 2 Set: Frost Base Damage, Frost Level Damage

Level 3 Set: Frost Base Damage, Frost Level Damage, Frost Level Damage

Level 4 Set: Frost Base Damage, Frost Level Damage, Frost Level Damage, Frost Level Damage

Level 5 Set: Frost Base Damage, Frost Level Damage, Frost Level Damage, Frost Level Damage, Frost Level Damage

So basically the spell should deal 20 damage at level 1 and 30 damage at level 5 adding 2.5 damage each level.

Bump?

Bump?

From my experience, the problem could be due to your use of a damage-increasing element to your veterancy behavior which is increasing the damage of your spell. First off, does your veterancy behavior increase weapon damage done by the hero? If so, what type of damage is being increased (i.e. melee, ranged, splash, spell)? What type of damage does your frost bolt spell do (I'm assuming "spell" from what you said before)? Are you accidentally increasing the hero's spell damage, thereby increasing the spell's damage as well?

To solve a problem like this, you can either remove the spell damage increase from the veterancy behavior or check flags on the damage effect which determine whether bonus/scaled/unscaled boosts to damage are taken into account when calculating the damage amount.

Thank you thank you! I can only assume time will tell if this works or not, but my veterancy behavior was indeed adding spell damage. I have set this to 0, hopefully this works.

Now that you mention it, it should have been rather obvious... oh well, it should be solved now, I'm just skeptical because at level 28 people were claiming the spell was dealing 100+ additional damage rather than the 28 extra damage from the 1 spell damage per veterancy level.

Hopefully this silly mistake will be a reminder for those in the future encountering similar problems.