[.915] More simple suggestions--don't break this thread, Firefly ;)

from Elemental Forums

*Letting pioneers raze improvements makes those no-cost punks even more out-of-balance, so I suggest allowing only military units (those with an attack above 0) the ability to tear down improvements like outposts.

 

*Along those lines, I also think there should be a cost associated both with pioneers and outposts (small, but not zero), and we already know the game can think in fractions of a gildar (so have a pioneer cost 0.2 gildar upkeep, and an outpost cost as much as a typical 3-unit group at 0.5 gildar per season).  This would make the strategic choices more obvious, rather than simply spamming pioneers and outposts to capture resources just because you can.  I know this is being addressed, but wanted to give my input even though I'm entering late in the game, so to speak.

 

*The tooltips disagree about what charge does; +3 atk/move on the first turn, or move/init?  My suspicion is someone thought charge was OP adding attack, so they changed it to add init (which is silly-worthless for a first-turn-only ability).  If that's the case, could we consider +3 melee-attack-only/move with a small defensive hit (like -5 dodge) to balance it out?

 

*The "Detail" button on the city menu moves around under various circumstances, which is mighty confusing when trying to do things quickly (via repetition and muscle memory).  Without something in the queue, the "Detail" button is in the third slot, but with something in the queue, that becomes the "Rush" button.  Oops.  I've rushed a few buildings unintentionally because the "Detail" button won't stay still.  Good UI design keeps an oft-used feature in the same place.

 

*In my last medium/normal game against Resoln, I encountered a HUGE stack of their units, and it took 2 of my armies 2 turns to clear the road (fighting about 9 battles per turn with each army).  While the enemy has every "right" to spam out worthlessly small armies, it is far more boring/less epic for the player to have to fight 30 separate battles on a single tile.  I have a save game available at that spot if a dev could use it to figure out how that happened and how to prevent it.

 

*Of the 4 games I've tried, the crystal mines seem to be a tad too plentiful (only a little bit, mind you), and I use quite a bit of magical items in my builds.  I never came close to running low/having to prioritize.  As a counter-example, mounts are rare enough to make you choose carefully which units get to ride, though not so rare as to make that aspect of the game worthless (i.e., perfectly balanced in distribution from the few games I've seen).  Could a simple fix be lowering the amount of crystal you get from each mine?

7,098 views 9 replies
Reply #1 from Elemental Forums Top


 
*Of the 4 games I've tried, the crystal mines seem to be a tad too plentiful (only a little bit, mind you), and I use quite a bit of magical items in my builds.  I never came close to running low/having to prioritize.  As a counter-example, mounts are rare enough to make you choose carefully which units get to ride, though not so rare as to make that aspect of the game worthless (i.e., perfectly balanced in distribution from the few games I've seen).  Could a simple fix be lowering the amount of crystal you get from each mine?

End of quote

 

Don't do that, please, it depend too much from the map (in the last one I was ever in need of cristal, and with a lot of horse).

is a good thing, in this way in every game you need to create differents troops.

Reply #2 from Elemental Forums Top

*Letting pioneers raze improvements makes those no-cost punks even more out-of-balance, so I suggest allowing only military units (those with an attack above 0) the ability to tear down improvements like outposts.

*Along those lines, I also think there should be a cost associated both with pioneers and outposts (small, but not zero), and we already know the game can think in fractions of a gildar (so have a pioneer cost 0.2 gildar upkeep, and an outpost cost as much as a typical 3-unit group at 0.5 gildar per season).  This would make the strategic choices more obvious, rather than simply spamming pioneers and outposts to capture resources just because you can.  I know this is being addressed, but wanted to give my input even though I'm entering late in the game, so to speak.

End of quote

I'll keep it short this time. ;)

I'm hoping FE completely reorients the pioneer/scout system.

I agree, everything should cost maintenance...that includes pioneers and outposts and anything else that's free. I suspect FE is already proceeding in that direction....

I hope maintenance costs for pioneers (and scouts) are NOT linear...ie 0.2 gilder/pioneer. It should be 0.2 for 1 pioneer. 0.6 for 2 pioneers. 1.2 for 3 pioneers. etc. You want to spam? It's going to cost you.

I hope it takes time to build resource improvements. Harder to build and a little harder to destroy would make for some choices to be made in what you want first and what your priorities are...

I've explained my hopes on leveling outposts and limiting resource availalibity from outposts in other threads, so I won't delve into that here...

I will reiterate the hope of redefining the pioneer, enabling it to only be able to build cities....and have the scout only be able to build outposts. This way, when your done your scouting, the unit isn't wasted...

I hope I didn't break it. XD

Object Desktop - Get all of our enhancement utilities in one suite
Reply #3 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting GFireflyE, reply 2
I hope maintenance costs for pioneers (and scouts) are NOT linear...ie 0.2 gilder/pioneer. It should be 0.2 for 1 pioneer. 0.6 for 2 pioneers. 1.2 for 3 pioneers. etc. You want to spam? It's going to cost you.
End of GFireflyE's quote

Why would you make it non-linear to extensively punish a strategy you are not comfortable with? I cant seem to get myself pioneer spamming, but I dont think it should be excessively punished by non-linear upkeep.

I still think outposts and pioneers should have a fraction of an upkeep, just so I wont see them all over though ^_^, 0.2 or 0.3 gildar each turn is what I think would work nicely for outposts, not sure about pioneers, meaby they should be a little higher :) They do need food, after all (The reason is I think it would impact gameplay in a better manner, but I always excuse these kinds of things with silly notes :))

Sincerely
~ Kongdej

Reply #4 from Elemental Forums Top


1: *Along those lines, I also think there should be a cost associated both with pioneers and outposts (small, but not zero), and we already know the game can think in fractions of a gildar (so have a pioneer cost 0.2 gildar upkeep, and an outpost cost as much as a typical 3-unit group at 0.5 gildar per season).  This would make the strategic choices more obvious, rather than simply spamming pioneers and outposts to capture resources just because you can.  I know this is being addressed, but wanted to give my input even though I'm entering late in the game, so to speak.


2: *The tooltips disagree about what charge does; +3 atk/move on the first turn, or move/init?  My suspicion is someone thought charge was OP adding attack, so they changed it to add init (which is silly-worthless for a first-turn-only ability).  If that's the case, could we consider +3 melee-attack-only/move with a small defensive hit (like -5 dodge) to balance it out?


3: *Of the 4 games I've tried, the crystal mines seem to be a tad too plentiful (only a little bit, mind you), and I use quite a bit of magical items in my builds.  I never came close to running low/having to prioritize.  As a counter-example, mounts are rare enough to make you choose carefully which units get to ride, though not so rare as to make that aspect of the game worthless (i.e., perfectly balanced in distribution from the few games I've seen).  Could a simple fix be lowering the amount of crystal you get from each mine?
End of quote

1: I completely agree on putting upkeep on these, just to prevent excessive amounts running around doing nothing intelligent, think 0.5 for outposts might be abit excessive to gain access to 1 resource, I sometimes have to put down many outposts to hit the scarce resources around the map (I play with scarce resources, since I think it helps improve the game balance ETC, see nr 3 as another reason ;))

 

2: Nice find, should probably put the tooltip thingin a post for itself so atleast the spelling would be fixed (I am not sure how much the devs look into details to each post, but usually tagging a post with a spelling bug will give it some attention).
Also instead of offsetting with a slight penalty to defense, I think the bonus should be lowered, I think move is way too plentyfull in the current combats anyways (One of the reasons I don't feel I need to come back to the game very often, since every combat is a "Melee-fest")

 

3: I kind of agree with this, but I think it applies to both crystal and iron, so there will be plenty of reason to have leather-armoured troops, and iron armoured troops, even if you have 1 iron mine, since the 1 iron mine should NOT be enough to spew out tons of armies (Balanced to the current placements of iron and crystal on the maps).

Also, there are far too little to spend crystals on, and most of these items I avoid because they inflate cost and upkeep on my unit for some benefit I don't need. (Resistance to fire).
I like when it becomes a decision to put out a filly equipped magical armoured super troop from my cities because crystals and iron are scarce, but even on scarce resource settings every single faction have tons of iron and crystal, and if I didnt get that crystal mine, I can just trade myself into thousands of crystals from the other factions because theyre not using it either.

Sincerely
~ Kongdej

Reply #5 from Elemental Forums Top

The mines issues seems like one of distribution, not production amount. I would keep things at their current resource production levels and have a lower distribution of those mines. The metal costs for late game weapons and armor could also be increased. If we are having fewer iron and crystal mines, how about a few more gold mines? They are far too rare I think.

Reply #6 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting seanw3, reply 6
how about a few more gold mines? They are far too rare I think.
End of seanw3's quote

Oooh, I heard of these gold mines, in the old tales of a time long since past, they are a mystery and rarely found.
But when a family found a gold mine they would have wealth unimaginable, and would soon rise to become one of the more dominant members of the ruling council of that country!
Imagine gold flowing all over your bed room, or so the rumours say anyways, havent seen any in my last game ^_^

Sincerely
~ Kongdej

Reply #7 from Elemental Forums Top


As a visual acknowledgment of the maul feature, if a champion is entering subseuqent maul/berzerk rounds they should accelerate the animation.  The whole attack would then appear to be an ever increasing frenzy of attacks until the poor vicitm manages to dodge an attack.  The speed is reset every time a new attack commences.  Since the animation speed is a option settable feature, it shouldn't be too, too difficult to dynamically change it just for the animations of berzerk attacks.

 

providing some way to readily identify cities that are maxed out on population/food would be nice.  Perhaps a color code on the kingdom city ledger?  Or frowny face above city names on game map?  There should be an easier way than cycling through the detail descriptions of all cities, looking at the food tool tip.

 

You also might want to nerf the effects of air-shards on slow spells.  After some point, (when the target's initiative goes negative?) the enemy toon just stands frozen in place and never seems to get a turn at all.  I ran into this playing a large map with dense resources.  The first monsters to suffer this fate were the large slow ones, like ogres and giants.  What's the point if you can turn them into a statue and chisel away at them with a +1 dagger?  Perhaps a minimum initiative below which they can't be slowed any further would make more sense.

 

 

my 2 cents...

 

fun game btw, I'm sure it'll only get better before public release.

 

Reply #8 from Elemental Forums Top

A simple fix for the Archery techs in this game, IMO, is having two bows per tech; Shortbows, and Longbows.  Shortbows would have better initiative then current bows, but not deal quite as much damage.  Longbows would deal more damage, while keeping the -8 initiative penalty.