Bingjack

[quote who="seanw3" reply="24" id="3214652"]I think the better solution is to keep most of these at high cost and then increase the player's ability to specialize a city in mana generation. [/quote] I'm not sure how much more of an ability to specialize in mana generation we need. Even in the current build, which is down a bit from previous builds where I used to finish with 800 mana in the bank sometimes, I usually end up over 40+ mana per turn by the end of my ga

[quote who="Tohron" reply="35" id="3214299"]Not yet. In the one game I played, I had a weird form of save corruption where you could load and play the game fine, but attempting to make a new save invariably resulted in a crash.[/quote] I think that's actually the garden variety form of save corruption.

[quote who="Raledon" reply="22" id="3214573"]You forgot alchemy: 100 mana to 100 gold. You want it the other way around...[/quote] 100 mana is far more dangerous and valuable than 100 gold. That spell is just designed for players who have an abundance of mana but need some quick gold. It's not supposed to be an equitable trade, or to replace the need for a good economy. Unless you were not being serious, in which case I apologize. I coul

[quote who="ddd888" reply="38" id="3214568"] Quoting Bingjack, reply 37 then after you are lvl 6-7 how can you kill a umberdroth? how can you complete a hard quest against party of enemies in a small spot? [/quote] I solo Umberdroths with Procipinee by level 7. But you would consider me to be using unbalanced mechanics to do it. (Buffed Melee) Which is accurate, but it's how she was designed to be used. But as long as she is capab

@ddd888 You seem to have a very narrow definition of what it means to be a "mage". You seem to define mage as a nuker, but a mage is anyone who uses magic to achieve their goals. It is possible to make a sovereign without magic, you know. Gandalf didn't throw fireballs at people. He used his will to buff himself up, and kick ass. Sauron was the most powerful wizard on the planet, and he armored up and knocked people silly (in the movie, anyway). In cla

[quote who="ddd888" reply="36" id="3214484"]you cant agree with something wrong from any objective angle air and life are not even remotely strong [/quote] Please stop. Best spell schools in the game at present, if for no other reason than Cloud Walk and Call to Arms. But there are may other reasons. Regeneration is godly(overpowered). Storm is all the nuke Ive ever needed. Haste is cheap, and always helpful. Shrink is a cheap spell that ma

[quote who="DGB246" reply="10" id="3214476"]@Bingjack You cannot use raise/lower land to create impassable barriers, you need destroy land (at earth 4) to do that [/quote] This is not true, by the way. I just raised land to a mountain tile, and it became impassable. It took two applications.

[quote who="BlackRainZ" reply="13" id="3214503"]I don't see how Flamedart is a useless spell. My Flamedart does like 80 plus dmg. It depends on circumstance I guess. How many fire shards you have, etc.[/quote] Yes. Flame dart cast by a character who isnt specced for offensive magic is a waste. Warlock, Evoker, Path of the Mage, etc. The right gear. And of course, shards. Properly specced, its a very damaging spell, cheap-ish and safe to use, as opposed to burn

[quote who="DGB246" reply="10" id="3214476"]@Bingjack As for Curgen's volcano, it's not just about the mana cost - it's about getting the spell in the first place. Have any of you guys found this spell in beta 3 or 4? I've never found it, even if I did I wouldn't cast it because I'd object to paying 500 mana which is grossly inefficient. Think about all the things you can do with 500 mana spent on the good spells and instead you throw it all away on this one spell

Create mountain was just meant to be a faster way of doing the same thing you could do with Raise Land over time, if I recall correctly. But I don't think that applies any longer.

[quote]I accept that raise/lower land is open to debate although I strongly believe they are overpriced to the point where there is little incentive to using them - 50 mana just feels like overkill. All it's really good for is creating shortcuts and you need to cast on loads of sea/mountain tiles to do that. Destroy land is cheaper yet that creates a 3x3 lake which is effectively a hard barrier - I know it has to be cast in controlled territory but that spell is much more e

Agree with some of these, but as has been said before in other threads, Raise Land and Lower Land should NOT be cheaper. They should not be able to be used casually in the early game. They shouldn't able to be used casually at any point in the game, really, but by the time you can do so, you usually have plenty of other ways to put a hurt on the AI, so it doesn't really matter. Don't see any r

Like I said in the thread on the same subject a few posts down, I too favor monsters doing their jobs and patrolling their zones to discourage casual expansion, over taxing the player too much for simply doing what the game requires them to do in order to play the game. Working to overcome the problem of a monster for a reward of a new resource is fun. Overly punitive taxation on expansion in a 4X game is not, although there's certainly room for fine tuning in there

Personally I dont think regen should scale with shards beyond +1 point per turn, at least not in tactical combat. Even a +3 heal every single turn is far too powerful, IMO. Perhaps the shard bonus should only apply outside of combat. I didn't even know about this bug, and already found regen to be an awfully powerful buff for the cost at +1 per turn. A regen effect should primarily be used to minimize downtime ( still a very potent and useful abilit

[quote who="DsRaider" reply="11" id="3214159"] Also you could take a page from Civ and have towns cost a upfront gold upkeep. That way you could only afford to have a single town early game. You would have to wait until it leveled to build another instead of just spamming cities everywhere. [/quote] A smart player doesn't just jam cities everywhere, though. Only the AI does that. Optimal building spots are few. If I have 3 good cities I

I'm really looking forward to Seanw3's content mods. :)

I don't want to see one playstyle enforced on people. You certainly shouldn't have to city spam, and I want the game to be playable with a single city, but some people *like* to e X pand in their 4 X games. I want to be able to build cities, and prestige is a very low number for much of the game. I shudder to think of that as a cap, either soft or hard. A lot of this seems like a bit of a kneejerk reaction to a situation in the OP

[quote who="DsRaider" reply="30" id="3214000"] Quoting Bingjack, reply 27I'm going to lose sleep if you don't elaborate. I should probably mention I work as an air traffic controller. No pressure, though. I believe there are two champions that can build roads.[/quote] Huh. Consider my mind blown. Still, cant really count on getting those guys. I don't think I've ever even seen them. :/ But it is a good i

I don't really miss that to be honest. There are enough limiters on the troops you can make, between wages, resources, crowded production queues and prohibitive production times, that I don't really want to feel like Im actually killing my city to make them. Plus, bottom line, the game at present pretty much requires you to crank out pioneers in order to claim resources and build roads where you want them, while at the same time requiring you to specialize your cities, so that

[quote who="Supreme Shogun" reply="11" id="3213935"] Essence isn't optional it's downright mandatory. To top it off, a city with no essence means no city enchants. It's that important. You can't even cast. [/quote] This is the first build I even remembered to use city buffs, except on my one military production city, which was almost never my starting city. Theyre powerful and useful, but I fail to see how they'

[quote who="Kongdej" reply="9" id="3213910"] Quoting Bingjack, reply 8 Personally I still think Essence is way too important. [/quote] It *is* powerful. Which is why I sort of think it should be rarer, and not a gimme on a start location. It makes a city a "magic city". 1 Essence doesn't do a lot on its own, but a city with a 2+ essence should be something you're willing to go to war for. On the other hand if ess

I'm undecided on whether essence should be a right or a bonus on start location. But I will Ctrl-N if there is no location within range that doesn't have at least 3+ material for production. Production is far too vital in this build to have a slow starting city. It's simply not an option to start a game with a 2 material bonus to get your infrastructure moving, even with essence and enchanted hammers. (I also always play with scrying pools, so pe

[quote who="Frogboy" reply="26" id="3213871"]There are units that can build roads btw.[/quote] I'm going to lose sleep if you don't elaborate. I should probably mention I work as an air traffic controller. No pressure, though.

[quote who="leeboy26" reply="2" id="3213846"]Have Pioneers only build Outposts and a settler unit build settlements (unit available though civ tech tree). Monsters should be more aggressive vs outposts like they were in previous betas, thouh (unless they have Wardens).[/quote] Scouts would seem to be the logical outpost builders.

Some of that seems a bit kneejerk. I suspect you just got a tough start position close to another AI. Usually I get more of a buffer before I have to start clubbing the AI off my resources. But I play on large maps. Right now Pioneers are vital, so you cant delay their availability, especially if you're playing on harder difficulties, where the AI will always grow their cities faster than you. Under no circumstances should they take longer to build, </