Let's Play as Kraxis on Expert/Expert settings [VIDEO]

The race for land:  Kraxis vs. Gilden ... a.k.a Ogres, Darklings, and Stalkers OH MY! 

(and bugs caught on video)

The legend grows as expansion leads us to find Tarth and Yithril.

Strained relationships and dangerous tension between opposing military powers...

[lots of gameplay issues a few bugs ... this is the best one for Stardock Dev team to watch]

The UNBELIEVABLE Conclusion...

I really would like Stardock Devs to watch Episode 4 at a minimum so they can hear me gripe about several gameplay issues that crop up during the video.

How come you didn't punch-out Resoln during your first war; when Ceresa was wounded in Hagudst?  Diplomatic penalty?  Hagudst was an awful nice city; and strategically, it's so in the way.  

I like the very systematic way you run your turns, going through each unit.  

When I played Kraxis, I was never very impressed with the efficacy of the fortifications; they only add something like 20% dodge, which isn't much if the troops don't bring much dodge of their own.  You build very defensive troop designs; do the forts add that much relative to advance-to-contact and take the first whack?  But if you're not going to advance-to-contact, why advance at all?  Seems like sometimes the mobs disrupted your line formation, but wouldn't have been able to if you'd built it a square in front of your starting point.  

But what a screwy ending!  Deeply, deeply strange.  

Good Morning. You've been on these forums for quite sometime now. I am currently going through your Let's Play at the moment. I'm going to toss out a bunch of question here and ask your opinion if you don't mind (maybe SD can use the discussion generated to better the game):

1) Karavox is using an Ice Staff in the first sets of espisodes. Do you find that the ranged attack of the Ice Staff is weak or underwhelming? Is it balanced considering the other ranged weapons available (ie early game bows) or versus melee weapons? I know the Axe has an attack of 8 (compared to the Ice Staff's 6 attack) but the initiative penalty is a great deal less. Also compared to the Burning Axe, which has an attack of 11 (2 Fire), it seems like there is an imbalance between these early game weapon types. Could you speak to this a little?

2) I noticed that you 'froze' the pioneer near Resolin for like 5-6 turns. It that a bug or simply underdeveloped AI? I suppose, along the same lines, you were playing 'chicken' with those cats for quite some time, trying to get them to chase your leader instead of your pioneers. Should the AI be able to anticipate that or see a pattern in that on higher levels of difficulty?

3) Even on episode 3, you have not yet persued the tech of Knowledge. Is it just that underwhelming? Is that a trap tech? Do you see a way of having that tech adjusted such that starting with Knowledge could be a viable strategy. Ideas could include increasing the Study improvement from +1 Reasearch to +2 Research? Or perhaps receiving a free +5 Research upon completing the tech?

4) I noticed that on the site of your 3rd city (the 4/4/0), there is a nearby earthshard....but no essence in coming from it (or not enough to warrant a point of essence). I know SD has done some flip-flopping on this....what should give essence and what shouldn't...and how much, but can you speak a little to the amount of essence that is being generated and made available in the games that you play? Should shards provide minor essence to surrounding tiles? Do Crystal Crags provide too much essence to surrounding tiles? Just looking for an opinion here on how much balance you think there is in essence distribution.

5) When it comes to the matter of AI pioneers settling cities, it seems to me like there is a common trend where the pioneer will move into position to settle a city, but will NOT do so at the end of it's turn. Instead, it waits until the next turn to settle. This is perhaps a questions directed more towards Brad and his AI but do you know why that is? Is this an issue you would consider to be important and should be addressed?

6) I've noticed that, as of the end of episode 3, you still have not touched your tax rate. Is the tax system currently in the game even worth playing with?  I have recently come to mod the tax system in my games and have found it to be a more meaningful spread....though it could be because I am actively aware of my changes as a reason for using it more. What are your views on the current tax system? Are there any changes you think should be made?

7) Very intersting idea about the Shops. Have points on the map where your heroes can enter and trade in special resources like wold pelts, bear pels, spider silk, etc, and depending on what you trade in, you can 'recipe' weapons and armor. VERY interesting idea indeed!! (Is this even possible Parrotmath?)

I'll stop it here....and post more later as items come up. Great Let's Play! (shows me a thing or two on how to play against expert...)

edit: Turns out I didn't have to wait too long before the end ...abruptly came. Didn't want to just raze the miscreant city and keep going?

Firefly, you asked a lot of good questions... I may not be able to answer them all in one sitting, but I'll start now.  First, you're right I've been around a long time.  I've been active on these forums since Elemental: War of Magic was just a twinkle in Brad's eye.  Steam says I've played LH 1071 hours... and that doesn't count EWOM or FE.

1.  I think the Ice Staff in the hands of a hero is weak not to mention the -6 initiative hit.  I found it in a goodie hut and wanted some form of ranged attack since I didn't have mages or archers yet so I gave it to my sovereign to use for kicks and giggles.  Ice Staves in the hands of trained units with rings and amulet modifiers are very tuf!

2.  I think it may be difficult to program the AI to know when it's playing chicken, but AI units should not freeze on a tile for multiple turns.  I have always been critical of un-escorted pioneers.  Human players do it, but the AI should not.  Think about Civ.  Have you ever seen an un-escorted pioneer in Civ?  Nope, never.  In this particular case, there was a spider in the city.  That pioneer and spider should have bravely tried to find new land despite me standing there.  Call it a bug or underdeveloped AI, but it needs to be fixed.

3.  The more I play the more I realize that there are only two techs I really need in this game to win on Expert:  Cooperation and Glyph Stones.  Game over.  If I'm playing on Ridiculous then I would take Knowledge earlier to try and speed up my tech advancement because the AI researches so fast on Ridiculous.  I like your ideas of spicing up Knowledge to encourage players to take it earlier.

More to come...

For me the best part of the first video is when your kid in the background asks if you're talking to yourself.  Color me snob but I can't watch anything beyond the first since watching videos in less than 720p is barbaric.

I enjoyed the commentary on the gameplay too.  

Color me newb... sorry about the 720p.  I'll make sure I fix that for the next one.

it's +20 dodge, not 20%, that's quite solid (basically the same as wraith blood, but stationary and without the -1HP per level)

Firefly, here's more...

4.  For me, I think essence is about right.  I like to find city spots with essence as much as the next guy, but I think it is pretty balanced (most of my cities have 1 or 2, some have 3 and some have none).  My issue is that there are too many cities in every game.  I think they need to increase the number of tiles required between cities to help control this.  I typically will play with "sparse" resources and "sparse" magic because I'm trying to reduce the number of city spots (not the amount of essence in the game) just the number of city spots.

5.  Yes I have noticed that same issue... the AI pioneer waits a turn before settling.  While this may be nice and helps the human player win a race to a spot, I think it should only be done on the lower playing levels (Normal and below).  On the higher playing levels (Challenging and above), the AI pioneer should build on the end of his turn (move then build immediately).  In addition, the pioneers should re-evaluate spots every move because it could do much better placement than it's currently doing. 

So then, there stands to be two 'types' of Ice Staff. The first type, used by heroes, is...mediocre. But the second type....the exact same staff, when used by units, is very good because of their unit mutiplication bonus.

Perhaps, it would stand to reason to increase the damage a little....for example...to attack 8 instead, BUT also increase the Crystal requirement to 4 ... or even 5, so that the units will cost more reasonably to their worth.

Thanks. You've given me something to chew on for a bit.

Could you go into a little more details as to why you focus on Cooperation and Glyph Stones. What precisely about these two techs makes them such an 'autowin'? Are the techs overpowered? Should they cost more? Should items within be split amongst other techs instead?

I know exactly what you mean....however I don't like the 'sparseness' of a map. Instead, I play on smaller map sizes that naturally limit the overall expansion a faction can do. The AI however, in it's current state, does not expand worth beans and usually ends up being single city empires and kingdoms, leaving me to fight the monsters and wildlands.

My most memorable 4x games played always had between 3-5 cities in the early/mid game and expanded towards 8-12 cities in them by the end of the game.

Comparing that to my current game, on a large map, and I'm already at 14 cities and haven't even conquered any AI. I'm losing interest very fast because it's just too much...and the unrest penalty is starting to stifle my economy.

Hi Firefly,

Just to finish where we left off...

#6 I can count the number of times I've moved the tax slider (1000+ hours of gameplay) on one hand.  I tried setting it to None for awhile to make research faster, but as I mentioned above there are only two techs I really care about and they're not that hard to get.  I had to use a Normal setting once when I was in gildar trouble, but that's about it. 

I think the increase in unrest is too high to change the tax slider.  It might be interesting to hear other people's thoughts on this tho.  Currently, the tax slider has two effects.  Gildar up / Research&Production down or Gildar down / Research&Production up.  I already mentioned I don't care about Research and I don't want Production to go down so that leaves me one option:  leave it on Low for the whole game.  They probably should have done something more like GalCiv where Gildar / Research / Production can all be adjusted separately or something like Master of Magic where the trade off is Gildar / Research / Mana.  That could have been way more interesting!

You asked about Cooperation and Glyph Stones... I really hate the <fill-in-the-blank> is OP'ed posts so please don't take this the wrong way, but range units with a +1 rings of ice and fire and +2 amulets of ice and fire (Glyph Stones) are the best units in the game in my opinion. Give them a 4th unit (Cooperation) and they begin take out opposing stacks in 1 or 2 shots.  I've created these units for every faction, but they don't use them against me enough.  The AI tries to build powerful armies with lots of armor, but guess what?  My mages make them go pop with the greatest of ease (watch my Resoln on Ridiculous video https://forums.elementalgame.com/445455/page/1/3368970).  Yes, they cost a ton of crystal, but they're worth it.  They can also bring down the World Bosses in just a few rounds.

I agree with your sentiment. It's what lead me to revamping the tax system for my games. Now I am often changing the setting throughout the coarse of a game. However, there is a downside. The AI doesn't know how to adjust the  tax system (from what I understand) so they are stuck at the same 24% unrest (my version) the entire game. I have the flexibility to go anywhere between 10%-90% unrest for varying degrees of gildar.

I'm wondering....would you be willing to test out my tax settings? Let me know if they are more dynamic....more useful?

(here's the info in case you are)

Here is the copy/paste for TaxRateDefs.xml

<TaxRateDefs>
 <DataChecksum NoParse="1">
  <Ignore>DisplayName</Ignore>
  <Translate>DisplayName</Translate>
 </DataChecksum>
 <TaxRateDef InternalName="TaxRate_None">
  <DisplayName>Free Spirited</DisplayName>
  <TaxRate>0.0</TaxRate>
  <Unrest>10</Unrest>
 </TaxRateDef>
 <TaxRateDef InternalName="TaxRate_Low">
  <DisplayName>Low</DisplayName>
  <TaxRate>0.1</TaxRate>
  <Unrest>13</Unrest>
 </TaxRateDef>
 <TaxRateDef InternalName="TaxRate_Normal">
  <DisplayName>Normal</DisplayName>
  <TaxRate>0.3</TaxRate>
  <Unrest>21</Unrest>
 </TaxRateDef>
 <TaxRateDef InternalName="TaxRate_High">
  <DisplayName>High</DisplayName>
  <TaxRate>0.5</TaxRate>
  <Unrest>36</Unrest>
 </TaxRateDef>
 <TaxRateDef InternalName="TaxRate_Brutal">
  <DisplayName>Brutal</DisplayName>
  <TaxRate>0.7</TaxRate>
  <Unrest>59</Unrest>
 </TaxRateDef>
 <TaxRateDef InternalName="TaxRate_Oppressive">
  <DisplayName>Oppressive</DisplayName>
  <TaxRate>0.9</TaxRate>
  <Unrest>90</Unrest>
 </TaxRateDef>
</TaxRateDefs>

I've also changed a line in ElementalDefs.xml:

        <!-- ** Taxes ** -->
        <DefaultTaxRateDef>TaxRate_Normal</DefaultTaxRateDef>

Lastly, I've also increased propaganda back to +2gildar/essence. My tax rates produce a little more unrest and so the extra gildar from this enchantment helps offset that:

    <SpellDef InternalName="Propaganda">
        <DisplayName>Propaganda</DisplayName>
        <Description>City produces +2 Gildar per Essence.</Description>
        <Image>S_Inspiration_Painting.png</Image>
        <IconFG>S_Avarice_Icon.png</IconFG>
        <AutoUnlock>1</AutoUnlock>
        <CanStack>0</CanStack>
        <SpellBookSortCategory>City</SpellBookSortCategory>
        <SpellBookSortSubCategory>CityEnchantment</SpellBookSortSubCategory>
        <SpellType>Strategic</SpellType>
        <SpellClass>ImpResourceBooster</SpellClass>
        <SpellSubClass>Other</SpellSubClass>
        <SpellTargetType>FriendlyCity</SpellTargetType>
        <Prereq>
            <Type>AbilityBonusOption</Type>
            <Attribute>Air1</Attribute>
        </Prereq>
        <SpellResourceCost>
            <Resource>Mana</Resource>
            <Amount>20</Amount>
        </SpellResourceCost>
        <GameModifier>
            <ModType>Resource</ModType>
            <Attribute>Gold</Attribute>
            <Duration>-1</Duration>
            <HasUpgradableValue>1</HasUpgradableValue>
            <PerTurn>1</PerTurn>
            <Calculate InternalName="Calc" ValueOwner="TargetCity">
                <Expression><![CDATA[[TileYieldEssence]*2]]></Expression>
            </Calculate>
            <Calculate InternalName="Value">
                <Expression><![CDATA[[Calc]]]></Expression>
            </Calculate>
        </GameModifier>
        <ValidTerrainCategory>City</ValidTerrainCategory>
        <AIData AIPersonality="AI_General">
            <AIPriority>60</AIPriority>
        </AIData>
        <HitSoundFX>Spell_Avarice_01</HitSoundFX>
        <SpellCastEffectName>Brilliance</SpellCastEffectName>
        <SpellCastEffectScale>.4</SpellCastEffectScale>
        <SpellDefEffect>
            <EffectName>S_Inspiration_Particle</EffectName>
            <LocalPosition>0,0,0</LocalPosition>
            <EffectScale>0.75</EffectScale>
            <EffectDelay>0.5</EffectDelay>
            <SnapToTerrain>1</SnapToTerrain>
        </SpellDefEffect>
    </SpellDef>

Again, if you don't want to test it out, that's fine too...just ignore all the spams of code above.

Completely makes sense. I see this approach being done in many Let's Play videos.

I wonder then if Glyph Stones is in the right place on the Magic Tech tree. Just throwing it out there, but what would you think of Glyph Stones if it had Arcane Mastery and Enchantment as a prereq? (Consequently, Arcane Apparel would also have Arcane Mastery as a prereq instead of Glyph Stones)

Moving Glyph Stones slightly further down the tech tree, even if the research cost were the same, would make that particalur strategy harder to achieve...moving that type of power from midgame to endgame.

Thoughts?

the mages would be less problematic if heart of fire and aura of grace weren't in the game. i think those two buffs are the bigger game breakers. i mean, seriously, units from a 3 essence fort easily outperform basic units with gear that is one tier higher. 

also, i think it wouldn't break the game if those mage units actually used mana to throw their fire/frost bolts. maybe 1 mana per shot for each figure in the unit. they would still be superior, but no longer shoot magic missiles for free.

to make the abuse on high difficulty less problematic, AI units could also get bonus fire& frost resistance to counter simplistic "I WIN" strategies like blizzard spam, mage spam etc.

Wow. That could be devastational.....what happens if you run out of mana ?? You're mages become a slaughter....

Though, it would definately brew arguement for having alternatives in your army should such an outcome occur.

Expanding your idea further, since I am currently working on modifying staffs, I imagine that all staffs with a ranged attack should be consuming mana...

This is a very interesting thought indeed....

edit: Adding to this thought here for a moment. I've been going through staves and giving the ranged attack to help boost there effectiveness, thinking the weapon type to be too weak. Adding a mana cost per attack could swing the balance back again, making staves unattractive because of that mana cost. Maybe the mana cost would need to just be applied for units ... and not for sovereigns. Is that even possible?

Azunai, you might have come up with two great ideas in one post... have the mage staffs cost mana for each attack and give the AI spell resistance buffs on the higher playing levels.  Quick!  Somebody call Derek.