[Balance] Map Generation (and a bit about difficulty)

from Elemental Forums

Soooo.... I recently started a game, where withing starting eyesight, were 5, yes, that's right, 5 of the big dragon statues.  2 of which would have been within the boundary of my starting city if I had even bothered founding it.  Does anyone else think that having tons of late game opportunities, but none early game, kinda makes for a boring starting location? 

Honestly, the random map generation has mostly disappointing me in this game.  In the solid majority of the games I've played, I am very, very quickly surrounded by enemies that my champions and units can't defeat.  I need to wait 30, 50, 100 turns to build several more units and move them into place, or to gain a few key military techs to make my heroes tougher....  Hitting the "End turn" button over and over and over is not my idea of a good time.

 

It's almost kind of amusing that Stardock is pretty much the only company that has ever made games that I sometimes lose to on normal difficulty, the other being Gal Civ 2... in Gal Civ 2 though, it only happens if the enemy expanded SUPER fast, and I was screwed for starting locations, so they have about a 4 to one size advantage (happened a few times). 

In this game, I feel like almost every game I'm screwed for starting location... I'm not saying I need a paradise with 6 food and 5 materials or something crazy like that, I just want to not so constantly be surrounded by high level super tough creatures within 4 turns of my starting location....

3,369 views 8 replies
Reply #1 from Elemental Forums Top

I have to assume that quests were basically turned off for beta 2. In the xml it was literally turned off, so it must have been intentional to force testers to look at other aspects of the game. dragon statues only show because they are force spawned as part of the Masterquest. Lairs are not perfect either. They have yet to distribute them well. Mites and Wildings should be the only thing within 4 tiles of your start. From 8 tiles out or more, creatures should be extremely tough. They need to have an unmovable guard over their lairs and several smaller armies that protect the general vicinity. The worst thing about all of this is that your army is primarily limited by wages. So you will be spending all your money to field 4 units to join your Sov and a hero, using the units as tanks and letting your heroes wail on the beasts. 

But honestly these are things the devs are well aware of and the map generator is more than capable of doing, were the switches set right internally. I also have to question whether or not you would be better served playing on an easier difficulty level. If you are having trouble with monsters, you should be able to test bugs and pacing fine at lower levels. You could also take a dive into the ElementalDefs.xml to tweak the monster spawns to your liking. 

 

What world settings are you using? 

Reply #2 from Elemental Forums Top

I cannot see your point here. I play with challenging/hard and dense monsters. There are plenty of stuff to do in the beginning. Bandits, spiders, ogres, mites and more to kill. I often cast a summon early (shadow warg) or get the sand golum through an item. I dont feel the need to produce any extra units until a while into the game. You will normally get a second hero near your starting position. These two pluss summons will kill the smaller armies.

Galactic Civilizations IV
Reply #3 from Elemental Forums Top


The dragon statue spawning is a bug that has already been reported.  It happens occasionally and extends throughout the entire map.

Reply #4 from Elemental Forums Top

In response to poster number 2, I do kill the smaller armies.  There are only a few of them nearby, this gets me a level, MAYBE, MAYBE 2 if I'm lucky... and them I'm stuck waiting for smaller armies to respawn (which takes forever) or for units to be completed to serve as casualties, much like seanw3 said. 

I play on all the default settings, because I know that for most games, after I learn how the game works (which doesn't take me long, assuming there is ANY logic to the game)  I do very well on normal.  If this isn't the case for a game... then the game probably isn't balanced right.  I'm sure that just sounds like I have a huge ego... but I know me, and I know it's true.  A game where i don;t do well on normal difficulty most of the time... has a very hard normal.  Which will probably piss people off when they get their butt kicked by "normal", it's kinda a slap to the ego of people who are more sensitive. 

 

Honestly, I think I'm going to have to step away from this beta till the next patch or two, this boring early game play is really killing me.  Thanks for some feedback guys!

 

Reply #5 from Elemental Forums Top

Might I suggest you try my Waiting For Next beta Mod? It is specifically designed to make the early game fun. You get some well equipped starting units and custom Sovs can get special armor and weapons to start. The creatures all start out as full 9 unit armies so you have some hacking and slashing and whacking to do before your land is safe. There is alot more to it than that, but the mod tries to address user beta concerns within the limits of the current version.

Reply #6 from Stardock Forums Top

Quoting Markon, reply 4
In response to poster number 2, I do kill the smaller armies.  There are only a few of them nearby, this gets me a level, MAYBE, MAYBE 2 if I'm lucky... and them I'm stuck waiting for smaller armies to respawn (which takes forever) or for units to be completed to serve as casualties, much like seanw3 said. 

I play on all the default settings, because I know that for most games, after I learn how the game works (which doesn't take me long, assuming there is ANY logic to the game)  I do very well on normal.  If this isn't the case for a game... then the game probably isn't balanced right.  I'm sure that just sounds like I have a huge ego... but I know me, and I know it's true.  A game where i don;t do well on normal difficulty most of the time... has a very hard normal.  Which will probably piss people off when they get their butt kicked by "normal", it's kinda a slap to the ego of people who are more sensitive. 

 

Honestly, I think I'm going to have to step away from this beta till the next patch or two, this boring early game play is really killing me.  Thanks for some feedback guys!

 
End of Markon's quote

Normal settings should be hard. If people want to have everything handed to them and have thier egos inflated then let them play easy.

Reply #7 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Bellack, reply 6

Normal settings should be hard. If people want to have everything handed to them and have thier egos inflated then let them play easy.
End of Bellack's quote

Comments like this are not really constructive or helpful here.

 

For my own part, I agree that the map gen is way out of wack and creates an incredibly inconsistent gameplay at any difficulty level. You can get started in a place where the only legitimate starting point is right between two mid-late game monsters, or wander for 13 turns looking for a good spot, putting you critically behind the other players. Similarly, you can get wide swaths of no resources except what is useful late game or with the other faction only.

I am all for proper difficulty, but the difficulty of the game should come from the enemy sovereigns, the choices you make, and the land resisting expansion, not from failing the 6+/10 roll at the beginning of the game putting you way out of position. Sovereigns should start on a square that is useful, and be within 2 turns of a couple different playstyle choices on turn one for city founding.

 

I'm not one of those people who sit there respawning until they start next to both a shard and a goldmine, but I really do consider having to restart even 30% of your games because you started between a swamp and a mountain with no resources in sight, or needing to move 4-6 turns to find a place to start that has any expansion capacity whatsoever to be a balance failing.

Reply #8 from Elemental Forums Top

Malsqueek, I think you put it even better than I did, thank you.  I wouldn't mind an occasional game where the starting location was only OK (not even good) for a city, as long as all the surrounding terrain had level appropriate monsters for me to fight, and the closest good expansion spot wasn't 20 turns away and protected by end game difficulty monsters.

 

The primary point of my post wasn't the difficulty, that was a side note.  The primary point of the post was the random map generation still has a way to go.  As long as fair share of us comment on this, I am sure the good people at Stardock will take notice and do something about it.

 

With that said, in response to Bellack; Hard settings should be hard.  Normal should be a moderate challenge.  Easy should be easy.  I feel when I have a decent (or even better yet, a good) starting location, that this is the case.  When my starting location is surrounded by powerful creatures and heroes that only the enemy can use (other than the ONE hero I always seem to find), it takes FOREVER to get enough forces and tech to break out.  That's not enticing game play.  It's boring and kinda frustrating, and it's not a result of any good or bad choices I made, it's a result of a random map generator that still needs some fine tuning.