Tome of Alchemy
Uses the four elemental powers to create a visibility protection shield to cloak the user while slowly healing it.(Arbiter + set HP%s?)

Additional requirements: Elemental stones of earth, wind, water and fire (maybe?)

@KerriganDuran: By default the zealots are stuck around the ultralisk, but when Blade Dance is used they can move around freely. This leaves the ultralisk more vulnerable to attack, though.

Tome of the Pit: Represented by a lurker. Nearby units are pulled in and attacked on the way. Higher levels increase the radius affected, add more lurkers, and/or remove/kill the units upon reaching the center.

... How many times do I have to tell you people: One of the characters can turn into a Lurker, so I don't want to use a Lurker for a tome unit!

@ForTheLose: Ah, that makes sense now. I'll add it if I can come up with a fourth spell.

I think if I use that idea, I'll only need one more tome.

Oh btw, added Tome of Firestorm, inspired by DeVouReR's suggestion.

@TassadarsuxZeratulrules

Rage- turns zealots into cracklings?

;o
How's about a Air-Tome? He can cast tornados (Recalls moving via ons/wraiths etc.)
also... the tornado could "pick up" some doodads like mineral chunks and throw it towards the heros would be funny
The tornado itself would not be destroyable, only the Tome. He also could cast a wind which makes the heros loosing control so they go back for a while, ofcourse the same just the wrong way round. You even should give him a spell for a dirt-wind, so the heros gets blind (blind per medic [pre placed])

actually, maybe some of these were already told, I'm to lazy to read... if not: hope that helps

and by the way, noone sohuld call TZ a newb... he is one of the most active members and he spents a lot to others (thanks for signature )
by the way when I voted on senawards 09 "best newb" for kidblaze, I though it was more a "flame section" but then I noticed the small print above... ofc I would have voted for TZ... he is awesome [I wonder if he had an account on SEN before...]

Post has been edited 1 time(s), last time on Dec 30 2008, 1:43 am by DeVouReR.

I'm not-t-t c-o-o-o-l-l? *cries*

Why would the air tome throw stuff at heroes/make them lose control? Isn't the tome supposed to be on their side?

You possible are ;P I don't know you enough to say
I didn't read the first post, if yes, they do that with the enemys lol >:D

Post has been edited 1 time(s), last time on Dec 30 2008, 1:39 am by DeVouReR.

To most repliers:
The main thing to keep in mind is that this system is supposed to be simple. You can tell based on the current examples that are listed in the OP. The more complex the spell, the less likely it'll be used.

@ TassadarZeratul
In that case, looking at your summons, it's best that damage based summons are OPTIMIZED for that particular tome unit, but still usable for other ones. Otherwise, some tomes are only used to summon a unit and are just...switched out immediately. It makes the tome unit itself pretty worthless.
1) Terran infantry are fine. Low hp means they die fast as medic can only heal 1 unit at a time. They need to go into a bunker, which needs a scv repairing to stay alive long enough. Infantry then benefit greatly from a SCV being around, but can still be used from all other tome forms. Just control their max number.
2) Protoss Reavers and Dragoons can be easily modified. Make most of their health in shields. Allow maximum of 1 Shield Battery. When the Probe is out, always set shield battery energy to 100%. When the Probe isn't out, let it do whatever (as in, it will run out of energy now). Reavers and Dragoons are now usable, but benefit more when Probe is around. Just control their max number.
3) Infested Terrans and Scourges are fine. They're suicide units. Just control their max number. The same goes with Broodlings as they will die over time. Just control their max number. A unit that suicides or dies over time encourages players to switch back to the original tome unit, but they don't have to.
4) One problem that I can see so far is the Zergling. It gains no benefit from the Queen and you aren't encouraged to switch back to her. My suggestion would be to remove Zerglings and give the Queen an energy refill option that costs gas. This combos with Broodlings as she can cast them far more often. You still have to control the max number of Broodlings though or this could be overpowered.
5) The other problem I can see is the Hydralisk summon. Again, it gains no benefit from the Dark Archon being around. Don't give Dark Archon form a summon. Think of something else. Maybe give him ground hallucinations? Or give him an attacking unit that does 0 damage while managing its maximum count. It'll be difficult to combo with maelstrom though.

Tome of Firestorm Sucks, Remove it NOW:
1) Emp may be inconsistent to trigger and possibly requires a dedicated computer player. I'm surprised you're doing this. It makes Vessel EMP tome redundant. Coding stacked Irradiate is more consistent and promising. Remove this ability. If you really REALLY want a trap similar to do, you can just MANUALLY set shields to 0 and energy to 0 of all units in a location, but it still is redundant.
2) Only three spells? What was that about four?
3) How is the "high damage splash" going to be dealt?

Turn a hatchery into a lair, when the larvae are morphed next to a lair, different tomes are summoned! Morphing the lair into a hive turns it back into a hatchery. The hotkey issue is the only problem.

Or just have both a hatchery and a lair.

Put it in your first post if you want people to notice it. This thread has A TON of tl;dr stuff, so if you want things to get noticed, you'd best put it where it'll get seen rather than rely on people to read the whole thread.

Just in case you missed it, read my post on summons. Not overpowering summons is INSANELY important because typical Starcraft RPGs have abusive summons (low hp? who cares I got 255 armor upgrades! and summons with no timers! I'll just make a ton of low hp stimmable high damage marine summons, thrown in a medic, and farm the entire map!). You kind of want to avoid that if you want to be unique.

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As for non fail ways of using more than 9 tomes...
Movement detection using DCs as cooldown is my favorite, but probably not applicable for your map.

A possible method is to use Gateway or Dropship COMBO system, but it'll probably harder for new players to understand as it isn't immediately obvious. Take the dropship. Unloading like a...Drone and a Zergling causes a text message to appear saying "medic selected." If they then order the dropship to move, the player uses the medic tome. If they don't like the selection, unloading a Civilian causes all units to load back into the Dropship and resets everything. Again, it isn't immediately obvious though.

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Finally, here's some ideas for summons that can be used for a tome that might need a 4th spell. They unfortunately conflict with other tomes though, so modification of other tomes are necessary if you wish to use these.
1) A zealot summon with 1 hp, 10 or so shields, and 0 shield upgrades (this is a must for it to work), that spawns with Defense Matrix. There's a guide on how to get Def Matrix to work. The idea is that on summoning it, the combination of Def Matrix and its 10 shields allow it to survive for a while. Once Def Matrix runs out, it dies really fast. It can conflict with the Science Vessel tome as both have Def Matrix.
2) An Ultralisk summon that spawns with Irradiate already on it, 255 armor, and low enough hp that Irradiate will kill it. It is now another "timed" unit like the Broodling. It conflicts with the Medic because restoring the Irradiate or healing the Ultralisk immediately makes it too powerful. Still, I wanted to throw the idea out there.

1. Making the normal EMP redundant is a very valid point, and I'll implement a different spell. (I was going to do the EMP effect virtually, though.)
2. There are four spells: Magic Missile, Spider Mines, Fireball Beacon, and the EMP thing which I'm taking out.
3. Computer-controlled Siege Mode hitting a burrowed units. (I'd create several of them so I don't have to worry about cooldown.) Or maybe Spider Mines, except then I might have a conflict with Tome of Firestorm.

1. I like that one, but I'm not sure if there is anywhere to use it.
2. No. As you said, Restoration makes it waaaaaaay overpowered.

I'll consider that if I need more than 9 tomes.

EDIT: Replaced the EMP trap with a suicide blow-up-in-a-bigass-fireball spell. You like better now?

Post has been edited 1 time(s), last time on Dec 30 2008, 1:52 am by TassadarZeratul.

I was thinking of if you use a distruption web on a unit (enemy) it will create a few zealots or w/e you want to do for a few seconds or 1 second (1 second = high dmg tho, more = low xD) to do some damage

Ill think of a name unles you want to

EDIT : Maybe Web of Pain. Or Web of Thorns

Who would I spawn the Zealots or w/e for, though?

And added Tome of Bladewind. (The ultralisk.)

TZ what did you think of my hatchery/lair selection system?

Post has been edited 1 time(s), last time on Dec 30 2008, 2:01 am by ForTheSwarm. Reason: post collision

spawn for urself. (dur)
or if theres like player7 as a town and are enemies with the bad guys
then spawn it for them

The problem is figuring out who cast the Dweb. There is an allied NPC player (P7) who I could spawn it for, but then I couldn't give XP to the caster. And it would still need three more spells...

@ForTehLulz: I'm also considering that one, but I don't think I'll actually need support for more than 9 tomes, anyway.

spawn a corsair over your head for you
some ppl may hate it but they are lazy!
Edit: maybe you can make your corsair do it automatically
you kno the magic word (triggers..)

What if two people have Corsairs out at once? Then there's no way to check without EUDs or ugly shit like moving them out-of-play and seeing if the said Dwebs a turret. Remember that Dwebs go to P12.