Frogboy

Join Date 03/2001

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Elemental: scale of power

Our story so far…

In Elemental, you design your own units. The only units you can create in Elemental are either men or Fallen.

So that we can kill any illusions now: There aren’t cities where you get to crank out armies of Unicorns and dragons or goblins.

There are dragons and trolls and other such creatures in the game. But they are rare, special and have to be recruited.

Your units start out as peasants. And you can train them (which gives them more HP) and you can arm them (which gives them more attack) and you can give them armor (which increase their defense).

As anyone who has spent time in the military can tell you, one well trained, well armed man is the equal of many many unarmed, untrained men. So the scale of men in battle is significant.

Of course, when you bring in magic or deal with some of the titanic creatures of the world you quickly see the scope of battle. If you like the Total War series, you can imagine some of what we have in mind except here you can get that Lord of the Rings battle feeling where certain units just make mince meat out of whole squads of enemy units.

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Quoting ,

quoting post

There aren’t cities where you get to crank out armies of Unicorns and dragons or goblins.

There are dragons and trolls and other such creatures in the game. But they are rare, special and have to be recruited.

Your units start out as peasants. And you can train them (which gives them more HP) and you can arm them (which gives them more attack) and you can give them armor (which increase their defense).

Aw... so no gene therapy to turn peasants into dragons?

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As anyone who has spent time in the military can tell you, one well trained, well armed man is the equal of many many unarmed, untrained men. So the scale of men in battle is significant.

So my army of well-equipped, highly trained professionals will defeat the unruly rabble that my opponents throw at me?

Nice!

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As I have said before. Keep more articles like this coming! I enjoy reading them and thinking about how I would go about doing something like this.

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As long as I can have a dragon snack on my opponents army then all is well

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Strange- the forums page for Elemental didn't pick this up yet (on https://forums.elementalgame.com/). Must be something with Feedburner, or maybe it's just set to check hourly?

How do special abilities and magic items play into the mix? Thanks for explaining the effect of training and how to easily increase attack and defense, as well as a new post about Elemental. Always appreciated!

I think you set a good vision for the game (LoTR-like), but I'm concerned that some people may want to play with a much more prevalent presence of magical creatures. I wouldn't mind a way to choose the frequency of mythical creatures as a starting option (few to common), as it would add quite a bit of replayability and style. Perhaps starting setup could be a future dev diary?

I'm sure the focus on mostly man-made units is to make it easier to create units and go for a specific flavor of fantasy, but I'm also sure there are going to be a lot of gamers looking for a HoMM style of gaming since it will be a fantasy game, after all.

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A question- If I have 2 Attack and you have 2 Defense, does that work just like GalCiv2, where an Attack of 2 means potentially rolling 0, 1, or 2?

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Damn. Your veteran hero looks... fearsome

Lots of difference in hp between rabble and trained soldiers. I'd think all humans would have about the same hp but to hit and to defend chances would vary, with armor soaking damage. Is the attack/def/hp system definitely in or is it just an example to give us an idea of the system and different strengths of units?

And how would compare a channeler and a dragon?

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Is training going to only affect HP? I hope not, and that training could be used to improve attack and defense (maybe in a weapon dependant way). An example would be long bows, which wouldn't be very useful in the hands of untrained peasants, versus crossbows, where training doesn't help as much.

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I like it... tell me MORE!

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I like that fantastic creatures are so special. I do hope there is a way that allows to recruit some fantastic creatures with realitive ease though (like goblins or sprites for example), I mean I like having my hordes of monsters type armies. I mean they aren't all going to be dragons and stuff with 3 digit attack strengths compared to the single digit normal guys, right?

I really like the scale of power. I think its going to put dragons and such where I believe they should belong. I think it is strange that the dragon has only 3 times the HP of an elite vetran. I think it should be at least 5 times as much, if not more.

We got another Frogboy drawing of a Horse it seems

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Cool. Will a Dragon be able to attack more than just three untrained peasants in one turn? (I am asking because it says 3 moves) Would he be only able to use his 500 attack points against a single oponent in a large army? If so, that would make him rather useless against large armies, but still useful against enemy heros or special characters.

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Quoting Martimus,

reply 11

Usually the M:3 means he can move three (squares/hexes, w/e). It will be interesting to see how that 500 attack works out. Does it mean that anything it attacks is auto taking a dirt nap? Dopes it mean it can do up to 500 points of damage and so could wipe out 100 trained soldiers with sticks?

I also wonder why training raises the hit points rather than the attack and defense? They are all armed with a stick, but typically training does not increase your innate health 7 fold. Rather I would expect that he might be able to get more damage in with that stick or have a better "to hit" chance with training. Also I could see that he might learn how to block with the stick and or dodge attacks so his defense goes up. I could see a small HP raise such as 5 hp for untrained, 6 hp for trained and 7 hp for elite.

I LOVE the fact that this appears to be heading toward a "Total War" with magic and dragons playstyle. I am also surprised the dragon has so few HP, but I am thinking that "D:200" just might make that seem like a lot more.

I really would like a better understanding of exactly how HP, A, and D work.

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We got another Frogboy drawing of a Horse it seems

Yes! It is an especially good horse! Kudos!

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The three stat system is an abstraction, not an absolute mapping, of the effects of various items. Training increasing HP means you can last longer in a fight (if you consider HP to be the stamina needed to move around and avoid being hit) will increase not only how much 'damage' you take, but also (by living longer) how much you deal. So while it is indirect, yes it does increase your attack ability.

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With a base one hitpoint, training increasing defense and attack wont do much. It accomplishes the same thing by making them survive longer. The effective attack and defense are both much higher when the unit needs to be hit for 7 damage instead of 1.

This system makes sure you have to train high end units to make them worth their investment in resources, I rather like it. A ten attack and defense unit that costs a fortune would be so much crap if it only had one hitpoint, but with 7 from elite training, you're looking at a real badass. Simple, clean cut, easy to balance.

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God, I can't wait for this game but at the same time just as more training = more hp more time spent in development (assuming the developer is awesome like Stardock) = a better game so I guess i'll keep cool for at least 5 more months ya dig. That being said I like the general scale your drawing shows off. I was a bit worried about the power level you were going to give dragons but if the scaling you show here holds true I don't have anything to worry about. On a side note however I think it would add something special to game-play and strategy if you could give soldiers special abilities or attributes in addition to training and equipment. Like a charge ability that would have different effects depending on which unit you trained, for example with spearmen it would allow them to move 2 spaces instead of one but for a knight it might add +1 to attack.

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The three stat system is an abstraction, not an absolute mapping, of the effects of various items. Training increasing HP means you can last longer in a fight (if you consider HP to be the stamina needed to move around and avoid being hit) will increase not only how much 'damage' you take, but also (by living longer) how much you deal. So while it is indirect, yes it does increase your attack ability.

This may be the case for melee units, but ranged units fighting melee units won't see much difference between being able to survive one or two attacks.

I'd much prefer having different "addons" being able to have varied effects instead of the Galciv 2 case where everything was split into attack/defense/health/non-combat stuff. For example, riding horses could raise both HP and movement (a little like in MoM), and pikemen drill training could raise both attack and defense, but not health.

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Damn this is looking good...thx for another exciting update!

I wouldn't mind a way to choose the frequency of mythical creatures as a starting option (few to common), as it would add quite a bit of replayability and style. Perhaps starting setup could be a future dev diary?

Nice.

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Great stuff. Discipline and experience are what seperates the men from the boys. Its nice to see this game take that into account, as many do not.

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WOW is all I can say. I love the way this is going. Dragons being so dang powerful. Makes sense to me. I also like the idea that monsters cannot be manufactured. If we want them 1 we will need to find them, and 2 we will need to convince them to come and play there part with our team.

This is just WOW. Can't wait to play this game.

ALL HAIL THE FROG!

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The advantage of training increasing one thing is consistency and simplicity. It increases effectiveness by making your units last longer (a 7 HP 1A unit will beat 3 1 HP 1A units).

Letting people train the other stats up adds complexity, but does it add anything to the game other then complexity?

edit - I would like to add that I hope HP goes up wit hsomething other then training. If the numbers stay consistent, eventually weapons will get strong enough that even "elite" trained units will be going down in a single hit.

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I think your concerns is a real concern, however is it logical to assume that if weapons get stronger so will armor? Maybe it's something to keep in mind.

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I just hope regular units still matter in Elemental. In Master of Magic, you _could_ play without heroes, but a single well-equipped hero could slaughter armies by himself. It's even worse in Dominions3, where army size is actually measured in number of heroes and battle mages, and regular units become obsolete very soon. SC's (Supercombatants) are the only way to survive mass destruction spells.

Please do something to keep heroes in check. Don't let the game degenerate into hero-equipping contest. And I hope supernatural beasts (dragons, trolls) don't take the spot occupied by heroes/SCs mentioned in the two games.

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As this is the second time i´ve read one of the developers comparing the Elemental Tactical Battles, at least to some degree, to the Total War series, i got the burning question how "Total War-esque" the battles in Elemental will get.

Especially since, if i´m reading this correct, the sole benefit of a mount according to this design-sheet is more "moves". Will our mounted knights also get boni fighting soldiers armed with swords and will they also be more vulnerable to soldiers armed with lances?

On a personal note, i would love it, since it would make for far more tactical and "realistic" battles.

First post in an englisch-speaking forum for me. Hope i didn´t make to many grammar mistakes...

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Quoting Cookie_1,

reply 24

On a personal note, i would love it, since it would make for far more tactical and "realistic" battles.

First post in an englisch-speaking forum for me. Hope i didn´t make to many grammar mistakes...

It was an illegible mess! Only joking that seemed perfect to me

I agree entirely with your post anyway; I really hope there's a lot of depth to the tactical battles including, but not limited to, bonuses for flanking, a morale system, the ability for certain units to charge, etc etc

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