Some advances are inferior/outright useless/don't work properly

[Discontinuum]

This one was reported on forums https://forums.wesnoth.org/viewtopic.php?p=665381#p665381

The Externimator has an 'murderous_frenzy' upgrade, which adds an new 'charging backstab' attack based on his original 'backstab' dagger attack. It costs 3 advances and the final damage is 10% lower and the 'charging backstab' weapon special is worse than 'backstab'.

I tried to give something like 'Nocturnal Cloak' to him and realized that they cannot cumulate to let him do quad damage and receives double back.

So I think this advancement is meaningless and a waste of experiences.

And yeah, the charging backstab bonus attack can't acquire backstab to cumulate, also by itself charging backstab is inferior than both backstab and charge. And the damage of that bonus attack is even smaller than of the basic dagger one.

(I have some more advancements to discuss but I'll write them a bit later)

[Dugy]

Backstab used to stack, but I changed it at some point, not realising it would make the Exterminator suck.

It seems that only Blackguard and Exterminator have charging backstab. Blackguard seems to be an underused unit overall.

Maybe there could be a change to make charging backstab actually stack with other sources of backstab?

[Discontinuum]

What about increasing damage? You're charging after all, why not to reward it with damage boost? It's frenzy after all

[Dugy]

That increase would have to be asymetric, because it would be inconvenient to increase the damage received so much.

My idea was to make it stack with normal backstab, so that getting normal backstab and attacking with that attack would result in an increase of damage taken and a massive increase in damage dealt.

[Discontinuum]

If it should stack with a usual backstab, then yeah, damage shouldn't be increased

[Discontinuum]

Another advancement issue from the same forum post

In chapter 10 Krux_later born with a 'marksman' weapon special in his sword attack, yet he has an 'sword2_marksman' advancement to add another 'marksman'.

[Dugy]

I changed that upgrade to add focused and remove marksman.

[Discontinuum]

Now, about advancements I concern to be underused, several unit types (Delly, Swordsmaster, Forester, Shadowalker) have an advancement for parry extra attack, with the "parry" weapon special. And to be honest I have suspicions about these ones. For Champion "parry" is superb, it's on his primary attack. But bonus parry attacks have -70% strikes, and for me their usefulness is in question. You have like 12-5 attack and 10-1 with parry, and you can benefit from parry only in attack (in defense this ability doesn't work), and only when the defending enemy has a lot of strikes and misses a lot. Or maybe I don't understand how this ability and bonus attack is supposed to be useful for those units?

[Dugy]

The idea was that if the enemy has a lot of attacks and a good chance to miss, the unit with parry will hit back a lot of times. Howerever, there are way too few units with enough attacks to make it worth the usual penalty. So this penalty probably could be reduced without too much balance problems.

[Discontinuum]

Parry finally became sensible, the question with charging backstab is still to be resolved, so charging backstab should be stackable with other non charging backstabs? Or what do you think would be better?

Also, a little question: soul eater thunder attack isn't magical. Is it supposed to be? (So meteor is useful as it's magical, thunder is not) Or was it missed?

[Dugy]

charging backstab should be stackable with other non charging backstabs? Or what do you think would be better?

It was intended to be a weaker form of backstab, but that probably makes it useless if we consider the availability of backstab on gear. So probably they should be stackable.

soul eater thunder attack isn't magical. Is it supposed to be? (So meteor is useful as it's magical, thunder is not) Or was it missed?

This is probably a mistake. The reason why meteor and the others are magical is that they damage to so many enemies that it's quite awkward that the chance to hit depends on a specific unit's defence - it can also be exploited by targeting a unit standing in water or some other bad terrain and using it to have a high chance to hit against a lot of units. So yeah, it would be probably better if this one was also magical.